Jeanne Williquett is playing her part well in a bioterrorism drama meant to test this city’s readiness for an attack. She desperately tells anyone who will listen that she has anthrax.
“I have a fever,” she tells a nurse, who nods along, trying to calm her. “They say anthrax starts with a fever.”
Volunteers like Williquett are helping planners test Tucson’s ability to quickly distribute antibiotics after an attack.
It’s the sort of exercise other states and cities are likely to run as they upgrade and test their response systems. The federal government has handed out $1 billion to help states plan for bioterrorism, with more on the way, and states are required to show they are making progress.
But outside experts caution that if exercises aren’t challenging enough, they can offer a false sense of security.
One state, Florida, is ready to receive the federal stockpile of drugs and medical supplies needed in a disaster, according to a fall federal assessment, although other states may have improved since then.
At the same time, many communities have little idea how they would handle a surge of patients or produce enough isolation beds to keep a crush of infectious people away from others.
