Preparing for influenza – pandemic plans in the works

By Colleen MacPherson

Don Litz, left, Emergency Managment Analyst, and Nowell Seaman, Emergency Measure Co-ordinator. Photo by Colleen MacPherson

Imagine if 35 per cent of the University’s employees were at home sick for eight weeks at a time. Imagine that happening three times in a two-year period. As difficult as it may be to comprehend, that scenario is as the heart of the institution’s efforts to plan for pandemic influenza.

“Pandemic influenza has been on the radar screens of governments and health organizations around the world for some time,” according to Nowell Seaman, the University’s risk manager and emergency measurers coordinator. “The focus is on avian flu and the World Health Organization believes it is the type of bug that could turn into a very devastating thing.”

To prepare for what some experts believe to be inevitable, the U of S has formed a small working group under its Emergency Measures Planning Committee to develop what Seaman termed “a planning approach, a plan for a plan.” That group took shape early in 2006, about the same time as the city and the Saskatoon Health Region began shaping their plans.

As Seaman pointed out, the University must be responsible for its own preparation. “The health region is responsible for delivering critical health care in the event of a pandemic, not figuring out how the University can continue to deliver heat to its buildings in the event of a high illness rate.”

Over the next few months, the group will be providing colleges and units with information about the nature of a pandemic influenza threat, a possible scenario, a guide to assessing problems and risk, and a planning template. The goal, said Seaman, is to ensure colleges and units “know their operational concerns” in the event of a pandemic.

According to the University’s emergency management analyst, the process is similar to the preparations for Y2K “but this is a whole different topic with a whole different range of consequences.”

Don Litz has been working with the University’s Emergency Measures Planning Committee for some time and is now involved in influenza planning. A 33-year city employee who oversaw the installation of Saskatoon’s 911 system and headed its Emergency Measures Organization for 10 years before retiring in 1999, Litz said pandemics “are a different sort of creature.

“Ninety-nine per cent of emergencies like tornados or plane crashes happen in an instant. They have a short duration and a long recovery period. Pandemics last a long time, up to two years, and affect our most important resource – our people. And it’s going to happen come hell or high water.”

World-wide pandemics typically occur about 30 years apart, he said, and it has been 39 years since the last one – the Hong Kong flu. The key to preparing is “developing a reasonable scenario on which to base your plans. We’ve chosen parameters that are based on health organization information. We’ve done plenty of research to see what the other folks have found out.” The parameters the University is using – up to 35 per cent absenteeism eight weeks at a time and occurring three times in two years – are not the worst case scenerio, nor the best, but they are reasonable, said Litz.

As colleges and unit assess their own situations, their plans will be reviewed and refined by the working group, but that group cannot begin to know or predict how a pandemic might affect each area of operation. “Will they (colleges and units) be able to think of everything?” asked Seaman. “We don’t know what we might be facing so the answer is no.”

“Ideally,” said Litz, “what we want to end up with is a staff shortage plan” that will be able to answer questions like what are essential services within each college or unit, who has the authority to close down any or all operations, or what supplies should be stockpiled.

Many questions can be answered by deans or department heads, said Litz, but others are more global. For example, teleconferencing may replace face-to-face meetings during a pandemic period. The question then becomes what is reasonable in terms of upgrading technology on campus. In the end though, the plans should achieve three goals – accuracy, brevity and clarity, “the ABCs of good planning.”

The biggest challenge may be in encouraging or changing personal and work habits. “We need to develop a culture where we wash our hands, don’t cough on people and practice some social distancing – leaving five or six feet between people,” said Seaman. In terms of work habits, the most critical will be staying home when sick.

“The first line of defense is you,” Litz said.

Some background on the planning process as well as information to help individuals protect themselves and their families can be found on the pandemic influenza website – www.usask.ca/pandemic. That site will be expanded as work progresses, said Seaman.

“The occurrence of a pandemic disease is a certainty. We just don’t know when, but I hope we’re all still planning in 10 years time.”