Vigilant but calm should be our response

AMA Leader Commentary. By Timothy T. Flaherty, MD. Nov. 5, 2001.

AMA LEADER COMMENTARY

A few words about current events in medical practice

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A message to all physicians from Timothy T. Flaherty, MD, chair of the AMA Board of Trustees.

In the days before Sept. 11, our patients filled their medicine cabinets with multivitamins, aspirin, muscle rub and cough syrup. Today, they are stockpiling Cipro, debating the efficacy of various gas masks, and making inquiries about smallpox vaccine.

With all the news about scattered cases of anthrax and the potential for other biological threats, it's not surprising that Americans are feeling nervous. But if ever there was a time to resist panicking, this is it. There are better ways to prepare for the unthinkable. And physicians, not gas masks, are a key part of the plan.

Should an act of bioterrorism occur, physicians will be on the front lines of defense. We will be the ones who notice the first odd clusters of disease. We will be the ones who report such cases to public health authorities. And we will be the ones coordinating care.

That's why we need to start educating ourselves.

A good place to start is the AMA Web site (http://www.ama-assn.org/go/disasterpreparedness).) Links to JAMA articles offer the best clinical information available on diseases such as smallpox, anthrax and plague. It also provides up-to-the-minute information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as well as pertinent AMA reports.

We also need to become familiar with public health reporting systems at every level of government and to do all we can to strengthen these systems. We need to help create a reporting system that is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, all over the country. Because the sooner alert clinicians inform public health officials about suspicious cases, the sooner the public health response can begin -- and the fewer casualties we'll see. [...]