AUBURN – A program, “Local Partnerships in Emergency Preparedness; A Central Maine Table Top Exercise,” intended to test community response and improve readiness in the event of an infectious disease disaster, was held on Nov. 30 at the Hilton Garden Inn.

Co-sponsored by the Harvard School of Public Health Center for Public Health Preparedness and the Central Maine Regional Resource Center for Emergency Preparedness, the all-day program was designed to help local agencies involved in emergency planning, response and treatment to assess and improve their skills in dealing with a contagious infection calamity such as pandemic influenza.

More than 135 representatives from Androscoggin, Franklin, Kennebec and Oxford counties in Central Maine attended, including local emergency management agencies, public health officers, local city and town governments, police, fire, emergency medical services, hospitals and community health centers.

Attendees worked in multidisciplinary teams to evaluate their current emergency plans and protocols, clarified their own roles and responsibilities in an infectious disease disaster, practiced working together to respond to an emergency and promoted countywide cooperation and mutual aid and the resources available to the community.

The facilitated debriefing at the end of the exercise showed that while the majority of the participants were prepared for minor crisis, the resources of most of the communities would be quickly overwhelmed in such a disaster and that a coordinated preplanned response is critical to maximize the ability to help preserve the health and safety of citizens and responders.