Pandemic Planning: Are Universities Really Prepared?

Planning for a pandemic influenza outbreak at a college or university cannot be done in a vacuum. Like any emergency plan, it needs to be a coordinated effort by a dedicated and unselfish group of individuals at the university pulling together a multitude of people and resources focused on a common goal. There is an ongoing struggle among emergency preparedness coordinators at colleges and universities to know when they have done “enough” in preparing their campus to respond to and recover from a pandemic influenza or some other infectious disease outbreak. Every year new ideas emerge from various governmental, health or emergency response organizations on improved methods to assess the threat of a pandemic and updating response plans. The need to add to or modify existing plans to better ready their institutions of higher learning for such an emergency is ongoing. \ud In this dissertation, an effort was made to survey key individuals from emergency planning groups at colleges and universities in the U.S. to gather information on what is important in their pandemic flu plans and how they are structured. This survey evaluated whether these collective college or university plans are in substantial agreement with current CDC and WHO guidelines for effectively and comprehensively anticipating, preparing for, responding to and recovering from pandemic emergencies at their institution and in the nearby community. The data generated from this research study can provide pandemic flu planners with tools for evaluating when their plans are sufficiently robust to meet a pandemic threat and to minimize the impact on their campus in the face of rising costs, shifting university priorities and increasing demands on their time