Vaccine planning begins

By JENNIFER MCKEE
Lee State Bureau

HELENA – State health officials are planning how to immunize every Montanan against smallpox in as few as 10 days, said the state’s top disease tracker.
 

So far, said state epidemiologist Todd Damrow, the state has no smallpox vaccination plan. But on Monday, federal health officials asked states to work up plans to vaccinate everyone in the country against the scourge, which was thought to be eradicated, but has gained new fame recently as a possible bioterror agent.
 

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a voluminous set of guidelines Monday, detailing everything from how many people would be needed calm hysterical vaccine seekers to what kind of containers the vaccine would arrive in.
 

Part of the plan includes a model immunization plan for inoculating 1 million people in 10 days. Damrow said the state plan would likely look a lot like that because as Montana has just under 1 million people. The plan may have to be changed somewhat because Montana’s population is far-flung.
 

That plan calls for immunizations to be given out in 20 sites, operating at least 16 hours a day. Between 30 and 60 people could be vaccinated every hour. The plan is quite specific, touching on everything from the necessity of security guards at each location to estimates of how many people could watch a smallpox vaccine orientation video at each site.
 

“We’re anxious to develop the plan,” he said, adding that the state had held off with a smallpox strategy until getting Monday’s guidelines.
 

The federal plans don’t call for immunizing anyone against the disease right now. Rather, full-scale immunizations wouldn’t start unless someone came down with the disease. Since smallpox hasn’t been seen in the United States in decades, the federal guidelines said any outbreak of the disease would be viewed as an intentional attack.
 

Unvaccinated, up to 30 percent of all people who get smallpox die, CDC statistics show. Those who survive are scarred from the ailment’s weeping rash.
 

Only the federal government has access to smallpox vaccine, said Joyce Burgett, the state’s immunization program supervisor. Consequently, state officials would not – nor could they – launch a vaccine program unless national officials call for it.
 

Damrow said he and the state’s top health official would be reading over the federal recommendations this week and would have their first meeting Monday to lay out Montana’s smallpox strategy.
 

The federal guidelines don’t put any timeline on when states must have an immunization plan in place, but Damrow said state officials would work fast.
 

“There’s no reason to wait,” he said.
 

The state is still waiting to hear if the federal government wants medical personnel vaccinated even before a possible outbreak as a precaution, Damrow said. Montana also has no plan for accomplishing that.
 

Widespread immunizations are not entirely foreign to Montana. Although the state hasn’t actually conducted one, Damrow said state health officials already have a plan to vaccinate people against a particularly deadly strain of influenza, should one arise.
 

“Influenza is known to cycle and have pandemics every several decades or so,” he said. “We’re overdue for a good one.”
 

Wednesday, September 25, 2002
 

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