All Hazards Planning
Edward P. Richards
Director, Program in Law, Science, and Public Health
Harvey A. Peltier Professor of Law
LSU Law Center
richards@lsu.edu
http://biotech.law.lsu.edu/cphl/Talks.htm
Topics
What is an All Hazards plan?
 What are the elements of an All Hazards
plan?
 Why is All Hazards planning necessary?
 Examples

Preparing for bird flu
 Evacuation of New Orleans for Katrina

Episode-based Plans
Plans to Plan

Episode-based plans
Bird flu plans
 Anthrax plans
 Bomb plans


Plans to plan
What you need to think about, not what you
need to do
 No operational detail

What is an All Hazards Plan?
A unified plan that, as much as possible,
uses common strategies for emergency
response
 Emergency response is built on day-to-day
procedures and resources
 All Hazards plans are operational plans



They tell you what to do, not just what to plan
The public is fully informed and an integral
part of the emergency response
Elements of an All Hazards Plan
Analysis of common factors in the different
types of emergencies
 Relation of these common factors to
routine procedures
 Modification of existing procedures to
incorporate elements that will be needed
in emergencies
 Public information and education

Example
Transforming a Bird Flu
Plan into an All Hazards
Plan
Episode Planning: Bird Flu
Plans for emergency quarantine
 Plans for ethical guidelines on vaccine
allocation
 Plans for stockpiles of PPE
 Plans to work with public health, including
an MOU that says we will play nicely
 Plans for how to plan to handle the SNS
 Maybe some training on how to put on a
mask

All Hazard Planning: Bird Flu

What are core problems?
Protecting staff from infection
 Assuring adequate staff for operations


What are related issues?
Yearly flu pandemic
 Exposure to tuberculosis and other
communicable diseases in the workplace

All Hazards Recommendations:
Vaccinations

Assure vaccination status of employees
Mumps, measles, etc, which can disable a
force
 Yearly flu


Benefits
Reduction in lost time from work
 Readiness if there is an outbreak
 Resolves individual and union opposition to
vaccination before there is an emergency

All Hazards Recommendations:
Working Sick

US culture and especially law enforcement
encourages people to work sick
Limits on sick days
 Rules that you cannot be on special teams
 Increases the spread of diseases such as the
flu in the workplace

Set up criteria for exclusion of contagious
workers
 Change work rules to eliminate
punishment for being excluded so
employees will not hide illness

All Hazards Recommendations:
Personal Protection

Key personal protection
hand washing
 behavior limitations - handshaking, etc.
 goggles, masks


Recommendations
Train and equip all officers
 Use these for regular flu and other possible
disease exposures
 Make behavioral modifications so these
become routine

All Hazards Recommendations:
Public Information


There maybe a need to limit travel or impose
home quarantine
The public should be educated about all aspects
of these possible limitations





What is their role?
Why is it important?
How will essential services be provided?
How will you assure families will not be separated?
This will identify problematic areas and reduce
confusion in an emergency
All Hazards Planning:
Generalization

Staffing in emergencies
Any emergency that threatens the general
public will threaten the employees families
 You have to provide for the families if you
want staff to show up


Develop a general plan for family issues
Evaluation:
Episode Based Planning

Episode based plans are invisible until
there is an emergency
These are very low probability events
 The only testing is by artificial exercises


Quality control theory (Demings, etc.)
You can only achieve quality through iterative
improvement based on data analysis and
feedback
 This is impossible with an episode based plan

Evaluation:
All Hazards Planning

All Hazards planning does fit the criteria
for proper quality control
Elements of the plan are in operation at all
times
 This provides intermediate data, i.e., things to
measure short of a disaster happening


Improves routine operations

There is almost no data on communicable
diseases in the law enforcement workplace
Assumptions Behind All Hazards
Planning
Equipment and materiel that is not
routinely exercised will not be maintained
and will not function when needed
 Emergencies are the worst time to change
procedures
 Public cooperation depends on pre-event
education and buy-in

Political Reality
The public (legislatures) have a short
attention span and will not support
emergency response once they move on
to the next crisis de jure
 Reality Check:

23 states, including most of the most
populous, have done away with mandatory
childhood vaccinations
 We are in the middle of a mumps epidemic in
the Midwest - are your employees
vaccinated?

Lessons from Katrina
The Blind Men and the Elephant
Why the Evacuation Failed
Transportation Issues
Surface Causes
Evacuation not triggered until too late
 No provision for moving folks without
transportation
 When transport was available - school
busses - there was no provision for drivers
 No provisions for jails and hospitals
 No provision for secondary evacuation
form the Superdome and other facilities

Transportation Issues:
Surface Solutions
Better plans
 More modes of transportation
 Earlier evacuations
 "Manditory" evacuations


All sound, but all miss the point
Transportation Issues:
Root Causes
New Orleans has flooded frequently
 Most of the land that flooded is reclaimed
bay and swamp that is up to 20 feet below
sea level, not historic New Orleans
 People lived next to levees with water 5
feet over street level every day
 Flood insurance was not required because
it was assumed that the levees could not
break

The Implications of a Real
Evacuation

The only reason to really evacuate is if the
levees fail, which was ruled out
The Superdome and shelters of last resort
 Delaying the call for evacuation


Why?
40 years of false alarms
 Admitting the levees could fail would destroy
the real estate values in New Orleans
 Routine serious evacuations destroy business

The Real Lessons from Katrina
Plans based on politically unacceptable
actions will not be carried out
 Long term prevention loses out to short
term economic and political considerations

Do not build in dangerous areas
 Require realistic risk analysis for insurance
 Do not downplay risks that cannot be
managed

How Would All Hazards Planning
Have Changed the Outcome?


Focus would have been on the risks of living
below sea level, not just on the evacuation
Planning would have explicitly included levee
failure





Flood insurance
Business interruption insurance
Meeting appropriate life-safety codes for hospitals
Personal evacuation planning
Addressing these would have changed the
political dynamic, allowing a proper evacuation