Report says Kansas not prepared for health emergencies, disasters

Kansas isn’t prepared for health emergencies, according to a report released Tuesday.

Neither is the country as a whole, according to the report from the Trust for America’s Health.

“If we don’t improve our baseline funding and capabilities, we’ll continue to be caught completely off-guard when hurricanes, wildfires and infectious disease outbreaks hit,” said John Auerbach, president and CEO of the organization, in a news release.

Kansas received a score of 3 out of 10 key indicators of public health preparedness. Nine other states also received scores of 3 (Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Texas, Wisconsin and Wyoming). Only Alaska received a lower score, netting a 2 out of 10.

Gerald Kratochvil, spokesman for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, pointed out that the report is not as comprehensive as other measures available, such as the National Health Security Preparedness Index. If states increase their scores based on that index, they get one point on the Trust for America’s Health report.

Kansas most recently received a 6.5 out of 10 on the National Health Security Preparedness Index, compared to a national average of 6.8.

“This report (from Trust for America’s Health), unfortunately chooses 10 areas on a pass or fail basis that probably isn’t the most complete way to analyze preparedness,” Kratochvil said. “…If we want to judge preparedness in the state, there are probably better ways than just looking at these 10 areas and trying to decide whether it’s an up or down on each.”

The report also changes some indicators annually based on current issues, meaning states can’t be compared from year to year. Last year, Kansas scored a six out of 10.

The report criticizes the United States for responding to emergencies such as wildfires with federal emergency funding packages, rather than maintaining “strong, basic core capabilities for health security readiness.”

“This leaves our country unprepared to respond effectively, and scrambling to divert funds from other ongoing priorities when health emergencies, inevitably, happen,” the report states. “This leads to a situation of being reliant on emergency funding to try to backfill basic gaps while also trying to address the new surge problems created by any given crisis.”

The report says that Kansas’ flu vaccination rate is at 43.9 percent, the 17th lowest in the nation.

This year, Kansas received points for having an accredited state public health department, for biosafety training being provided in the state laboratory and for the state laboratory having a biosafety professional.

Bryan Murdie, director of planning and mitigation with the Kansas Division of Emergency Management, said the state has plans in place to respond to disasters. He also said they have the resources to carry out those plans.

“There has been a culture shift in emergency preparedness,” he said. “I would say that it has shifted from more of a reactive stance to more pre-planning efforts in which we can identify how we mitigate such events form happening, but also how will we respond to them.”

Areas the state received no points for included:

▪ Increasing or maintaining funding for public health

▪ Increasing overall preparedness scores between 2015-2016 on the National Health Security Preparedness Index

▪ 70 percent or more of hospitals meeting antibiotic stewardship program elements

▪ Vaccinating at least half the state’s population for flu

▪ Participating in an enhanced nurse licensure compact, which allows nurses to have one multi-state license

▪ Joining the U.S. Climate Alliance to reduce greenhouse gas emissions

▪ Having a paid sick leave law

This story was originally published December 19, 2017 at 3:36 PM with the headline "Report says Kansas not prepared for health emergencies, disasters."