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HMCC November Newsletter

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Video Now Available from “Working with Translators and Interpreters in Public Health and Healthcare Settings”

In this workshop, staff from the UMass Amherst Translation Center provided an overview of considerations regarding interpreting and translation needs, tools, and best practices within a public health or healthcare setting. Specific topics covered included: Should bilingual employees in your…

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Registration Now Open for Violent Critical Incident Tabletop Exercise

Building off last spring’s Active Shooter Planning Considerations Workshop, this tabletop exercise will have attendees examine their response, recovery, and/or continuity of operations plans through the lens of responding to and recovering from a violent critical incident. While the workshop…

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Commission Aims to Create Roadmap for US Role in Global Health Security

A commission including global health and national security leaders, and members of Congress has released a set of recommendations it believes can serve as a blueprint for improved U.S. action on global health security. “We began the Commission’s work with…

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This High-Tech Solution to Disaster Response May Be Too Good to Be True

Major cities are turning to a Silicon Valley start-up to help save lives in an emergency. But some fear its promise has been dangerously exaggerated.

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Opinion: A liability problem could delay supply of emergency respirators

Imagine an Ebola epidemic is ravaging a community, or a dirty bomb goes off in a major city — but health workers can’t enter the affected area because they lack adequate respiratory protective devices (respirators) meant to protect them from…

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CYBER ALERT – BlueKeep Exploit Affecting Medical Devices

A newly identified exploit, known as BlueKeep, is being used by unauthorized actors to gain system level access to healthcare networks via unprotected medical devices.  This exploit is similar to the Eternal Blue exploit used to spread the ransomware, WannaCry,…

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Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School Of Public Health’s Center For Health Security Releases 2018 Annual Report

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for Health Security released its 2018 annual report. The report details the center’s efforts to enhance research and analysis on major domestic and international health security issues, including emerging infectious diseases and…

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HHS Has Released 2019-2022 U.S. Health Security Strategy

Late last week, The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services released its 2019-2022 National Health Security Strategy, which “provides a vision for strengthening [the] nation’s ability to prevent, detect, assess, prepare for, mitigate, respond to, and recover from 21st…

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October 2018 Full Coalition Meeting

Our fall 2018 Full Coalition meeting drew together western MA healthcare and public health stakeholders to offer disciplinary and HMCC-level updates, and partake of a program focusing on models of community paramedicine and mobile integrated health. For that main program,…

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Blue Ribbon Study Panel on Biodefense Releases Updated Federal Policy Recommendations

Earlier this month, the Blue Ribbon Study Panel on Biodefense released an updated report, "Holding the Line on Biodefense: State, Local, Tribal and Territorial Reinforcements Needed", which highlights several recommendations for how federal policy can help to render state, local,…

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HMCC Leadership Elects New Officers

Jacqueline Johnson, Chief Operating Officer of Caring Health Center HMCC Steering Committee Chair

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Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response comments on newly released National Biodefense Strategy

"Today, the White House and four federal departments unveiled a comprehensive National Biodefense Strategy to make America safer against modern biological threats to the United States. In the 21st century, biological threats are increasingly complex and dangerous, and that demands…

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Stop the Bleed Training Kits Now Available

The Western MA HMCC now offers bleeding control training kits to western MA organizations to borrow, free of charge, when offering bleeding control trainings, provided the organization will not make a profit from the training. The kits, four in total,…

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Plan for Emergencies and Disasters During Preparedness Month

FRAMINGHAM, MA – Governor Charlie Baker has proclaimed September 2018 to be Emergency Preparedness Month to highlight the importance of emergency preparedness and to encourage planning for disasters and other types of emergencies. To help individuals and families prepare during Emergency Preparedness…

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We’re Hiring!

The Franklin Regional Council of Governments seeks a well-rounded, professional, and intelligent candidate for a 30 hr/wk grant-funded position assisting with a variety of regional emergency preparedness activities in western Massachusetts.

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Opinion: EMS coordination: Healthcare coalitions provide organized cooperation

Healthcare coalitions offer EMS a “seat at the table” for regional emergency planning.

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Pandemic Virus Exercise from John Hopkins Shows Our Vulnerability

A leading medical institution created a simulation that shows how a new disease could kill 900 million people — and it reveals how unprepared we are.

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Opinion: Changes to the Pandemic and All Hazards Preparedness Act are essential to saving lives in disasters

In this opinion piece, Dr. Kadlec offers his thoughts on the re-authorization of Pandemic and All Hazards Preparedness Act (PAHPA), and highlights his priorities and recommendations for further legislative commitment. Dr. Robert Kadlec is the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response…

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FEMA Releases Planning Considerations: Complex Coordinated Terrorist Attacks

Earlier this week, FEMA released Planning Considerations: Complex Coordinated Terrorist Attacks to aid all community partners, including all levels of government, infrastructure owners and operators, small businesses, non-profit organizations, and volunteer organizations, in planning and preparing for complex coordinated terrorist…

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More Dangerous Outbreaks Are Happening. Why Aren’t We Worried About The Next Epidemic?

Ebola. MERS. Zika. Nipah virus. Lassa fever. Rift Valley fever. All were in active outbreaks in June.

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Drill – Significant Stuff Going Down All Hands Needed

Some really heavy stuff is going down that requires the assistance of all local public health and community health centers with messaging.  Duty Officer are working closely with the state EOC to coordinate messaging.

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Winter Storm X – This is a Drill Post.

This is a drill post to gain practice with quickly shifting coalition status level and all necessary asks of the Coalition membership.  Note there are existing links in the template format already.  Further can be added as needed.

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2017 Hurricane Season FEMA After-Action Report

The unprecedented scale, scope, and impacts of the complex combination of hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria tested capabilities FEMA has developed and improved since hurricanes Katrina and Sandy. Following the 2017 hurricane season, FEMA conducted an after-action review of the…

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DrPH Health Security track at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health to launch next year

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Brooks releases bipartisan reauthorization bill to protect U.S. from public health threats

U.S. Rep. Susan Brooks (R-IN) has introduced the bipartisan Pandemic and All Hazards Preparedness and Advancing Innovation Act (PAHPA) of 2018 to reauthorize the nation’s main law ensuring Americans are prepared to respond to public health emergencies resulting from chemical,…

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Baystate Noble Hospital Honored for Stroke Care

Baystate Noble Hospital received the American Heart Assoc./American Stroke Assoc. Get with the Guidelines – Stroke Silver Plus Quality Achievement Award, recognizing the hospital’s commitment to ensuring stroke patients receive the most appropriate treatment according to nationally recognized, research-based guidelines…

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SAMPLE ALERT – WEATHER EVENT

Describe the event here. . .

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Congressional Leaders Call Out HHS Leaders on Healthcare Cybersecurity Center

A bipartisan group of U.S. Senators and U.S. Representatives wrote a joint letter June 5 to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar voicing concerns and confusion about the status of the one-year-old Healthcare Cybersecurity and…

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Antimicrobial resistance threatens our health security — both domestically and globally

Following the recent news that the new Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) reached an urban area where its spread can accelerate, congressional attention to reauthorizing the Pandemic and All Hazards Preparedness Act (PAHPA) is timely.…

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What Is a Healthcare Coaliton?

Lori Upton, MS, Director of Regional Preparedness for the Southeast Texas Regional Advisory Council (SETRAC), speaks to the fundamental composition and purpose of healthcare coalitions. Ms. Upton joined the region 1 HMCC and our Region 2 counterparts this past spring…

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House health subcommittee members prepare PAHPA reauthorization

Members of the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health on Wednesday considered proposed updates to the nation’s law on preparing for and responding to national and global public health emergencies resulting from any chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear…

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Tips for Emergency Preparedness

Healthcare Professionals can take slight measures to aid their facilities in preparing for potential crises. Here’s how. When it comes to providing safe and effective healthcare, the formality of following algorithms and protocols is perhaps more important than in any…

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Storm surge: After Irma, Harvey and Maria, providers prep for a new hurricane season

Amanda Leite's daughter Nicole was running a fever while her family was shut in by Hurricane Irma. The worst of the storm was tearing through the Orlando, Fla., area on Sept. 6, 2017, when Leite's 4-year-old was sick. It sounded…

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TFAH Applauds the Introduction of the Bipartisan Pandemic And All-Hazards Preparedness And Advancing Innovation Act–But Improvements Can Be Made

WASHINGTON, May 22, 2018 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The following is a statement from John Auerbach, President and CEO, of Trust for America's Health (TFAH) on the introduction of the Senate HELP Committee's Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness and Advancing Innovation (PAHPAI) Act:…

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HMCC Participates in Patient Evacuation Exercise

The Western MA Health & Medical Coordinating Coalition participated in a tabletop exercise on April 25th testing the MA Dept. of Public Health’s new Patient Placement Coordination Plan. Following federal requirements, the Department had to practice moving at least 20% of…

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Inside the secret U.S. stockpile meant to save us all in a bioterror attack

A SECRET LOCATION OUTSIDE WASHINGTON, D.C. — From the outside, it looks like an ordinary commercial warehouse, only much bigger, about the size of two super Walmarts. Inside it’s dark except when motion sensors are triggered. When the lights come…

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October 2017 Full Coalition Meeting

Our Full Coalition convening in the fall of 2017 was the venue in which we hosted JSI Research and Training, a contractor hired by the MA Department of Public Health to conduct regional Jurisdictional Risk Assessments in each Massachusetts HMCC…

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April 2017 Full Coalition Meeting

Our April 2017 Full Coalition Meeting allowed for HMCC updates to our membership, and featured presentations from Jessica Collins, Executive Director of Partners for a Healthier Community (since renamed the Public Health Institute of Western Massachusetts) on “Foundations of Health Equity”, and Chad…

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October 2016 Full Coalition Meeting

Our first Full Coalition Meeting was held in October of 2016 after a rigorous planning process to form the HMCC.  We had great attendance and participation as we outlined our progress thus far, and highlighted what was coming for the…

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