Wesleyan Hosts Public Health Emergency Training

On March 20, Wesleyan’s Campus Community Emergency Response Team (C-CERT) participated in a day-long training program to prepare for a public health emergency. The training, coordinated by the Connecticut Department of Health’s Division of Public Health Preparedness and Response Strategic National Stockpile Program, taught C-CERT members how to organize a Mass Dispensing Area and effectively receive, process, ship and recover stockpile medical assets.

Wesleyan C-CERT members, made up of faculty and staff, joined participants from the Middletown Department of Health, Cromwell Department of Health, Middletown Emergency Management, Middletown Fire Department and Middletown Police Department.

The training took place in the Freeman Athletic Center’s Bacon Field House. In the event of a real disaster, the Bacon Field House would serve as a regional distribution site. Wesleyan Public Safety and Middletown Police SWAT team provided security during the drill.

The Strategic National Stockpile (SNS) offers large quantities of medicine and medical supplies to protect the American public if there is a public health emergency severe enough to cause local supplies to run out. Medicines will be delivered to any state in the U.S. in time for them to be effective. Each state has plans to receive and distribute medical assets to local communities as quickly as possible.

Middletown Police escorted the Strategic National Stockpile vehicle to Wesleyan. Participants, divided into teams, unloaded multiple pallets of boxed pill bottles, took inventory and assumed custody of the assets. They learned how to generate pick tickets, label and shrink-wrap assets, distribute pills and load extra or unused assets back onto the delivery truck. For training purposes, candy was used to represent antibiotics such as doxycycline, ciprofloxacin and amoxicillin. Photos of the event are below: (Photos by Olivia Drake)

For more information on the training, see this past Wesleyan Connection story.