Stockpiling gas masks, vaccines ineffective against bioterrorism

WASHINGTON – Maine’s legislative and public health officials say the public clamor for gas masks and anthrax vaccines is an “ineffective way to prepare for bioterrorism” and that the public should rely instead on the biological and chemical threat response systems already in place.

“There is no need to stockpile antibiotics or purchase gas masks,” said Maine Bureau of Health director Dora Anne Mills.

Purchasing these items “only helps the retailer and manufacturer,” Mills said. “The public needs to know there already is a system in place to address biological and chemical terrorism.”

Since the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, more than 2,000 gas masks have been ordered from Maine Military Supply, depleting its entire stock. Most of the customers were concerned citizens who “wanted the masks for their own protection,” said John Robinson, an employee in the company’s Brewer store.

The problem with gas masks, said Eric Taylor of the Cato Institute, is that the public would have to carry the masks around with them at all times to be adequately prepared for a bioterrorist attack – and only against those agents which are detrimental when inhaled. Without forewarning of an attack, having a gas mask at home would not help protect the general public, said Taylor, an associate professor of chemistry at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. Moreover, “masks are not designed to handle lethal chemical agents,” Taylor said. “However, anything you can put between you and the chemical agent helps.”

“We are jumping ahead of ourselves here,” U.S. Rep John E. Baldacci said of the public’s rush to buy gas masks. People should be reminded that chemical and biological agents are not easily or readily accessible, he said, but officials are trying to make sure sensors are in place to detect chemical and biological weapons.

Aside from the rush on gas masks, citizens have been looking into anthrax vaccines and purchasing antibiotics as a safety measure. The anthrax vaccine maker, BioPort of Lansing, Mich., reported that more than 1,000 people have called within the last two weeks to inquire about receiving the shot, even though the Food and Drug Administration has not approved the vaccine.

The Maine Bureau of Health has instructed residents that anthrax or smallpox vaccines are “not recommended.”

Mills said loading up on antibiotics that combat anthrax, such as Cipro, would come at extraordinary expense because of the hundreds of chemical and biological agents that exist, each of which requires different medication.

“There is a large federal stockpile of different agents to combat biological and chemical terrorism,” Mills said. Vaccines ordered by the Bureau of Health are guaranteed to be shipped within eight hours, she said.

The vaccine stockpiles, which are being “beefed up,” are spread out among various locations in the country, Mills said.

Despite these safeguards, Mills said, she understands the public’s fear. “Everybody is concerned about terrorism. It would be unfair to say not to worry about it.”

In addition to airborne bioterrorism, some concerns about the state’s water supply have been raised. “Our water supply is more secure now than it was a few years back,” Mills said. The water systems, she added, “are heavily monitored.”

In a meeting Oct. 2 with Art Cleaves, director of the Maine Emergency Management Agency (MEMA), Mills said the Bureau of Health would focus more closely on improving its surveillance for unusual disease symptoms and on educating health care providers in identifying these unusual symptoms. The bureau said its aim is to protect against any public health threats, whether an intentional threat such as bioterrorism or an unintentional threat such as food poisoning.

Despite the public’s concerns about bioterrorism, Mills said she is concerned about over-educating the public about the myriad possibilities out there and creating more panic in the process. The bureau hopes instead to focus its educational efforts on the medical community, she said.

The Cato Institute’s Taylor, who served in the nuclear, biological and chemical branch of the Army, believes, however, that the public deserves more information.

Since the American public is the target of bioterrorism, people need to know the indicators of an attack and how to respond, Taylor said. People fear most what they know nothing about, he said.The reasons often given against educating the public include not wanting to panic people and the fear that it would be too difficult for people to understand the terminology and scientific details of a diagnosis, he said.

“I have a hard time accepting the panic argument because if you look at New York, they didn’t panic,” Taylor said. The public’s actions, he added, “speak well of public nerve.”

As for as the difficulty in understanding terminology, Taylor said he was not suggesting an effort to make physicians out of people, but only to provide basic information the public can use to feel more in control.

People should not be bombarded with obscure scientific terminology, Taylor said, but they should be educated about some principal symptoms of serious infections – those that are not natural reactions to the environment.

“People with allergies are extremely well versed in their symptoms,” Taylor said. “And they often assist their doctors in reaching a diagnosis. We all have a general idea of how our bodies react.”

Taylor suggested that the 1995 attack on a Japanese subway with the Sarin nerve agent that killed 12 and injured 5,000 may have had dramatically different results had one person known what symptoms to look for.

“Even if only one person knew something about the indicators or symptoms of Sarin, that one person could have possibly sounded an alarm earlier,” he said. “Instead of 5,000 people requiring medical treatment, it might have only been 2,000 – we don’t know now.”

Taylor said the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), through its Web site, should be used as a source to educate the public about bioterrorism.

Regardless of the route officials take in preparing the public for bioterrorism, the Bureau of Health’s Mills said, Sept. 11 was “a wake up call” for everyone. “From our standpoint, getting ready for bioterrorism is not very different from getting ready for any other epidemic,” she said.

The bureau has more than 20 years of preparedness in nuclear terrorism acquired while the power plant Maine Yankee was open, and is now preparing more against chemical terrorism, she said.

MEMA has plans within the next few weeks for an exercise with a bioterrorism scenario and has scheduled an education symposium for health care providers in November on preparing the state’s hospitals for possible biological attacks.