Business and healthcare leaders looking to fast-track preparedness for the H1N1 pandemic are gathering with infectious disease experts and Fortune 500 planners this month to determine how best to protect their employees and preserve their operations.
"The novel H1N1 influenza is rapidly morphing into its second wave assault. Within eight to 10 weeks, every organization will confront how to cope with sick employees and stay in business," according to Michael T. Osterholm, Ph.D., M.P.H., an international authority on pandemic influenza and business preparedness and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy (CIDRAP) at the University of Minnesota.
CIDRAP designed the two-day working summit, Keeping the World Working During the H1N1 Pandemic: Protecting Employee Health, Critical Operations, and Customer Relations, to rapidly prepare organizations for a pandemic threat that many considered theoretical but now see as immediate or emerging. CIDRAP will host the summit September 22-23, 2009, in Minneapolis.
"We're beyond theory and onto execution. The pandemic is here. And we need every business to recognize the impact they can have. It's not too late, but time is of the essence," Osterholm said. Results of a national survey of businesses reported last week by the Harvard School of Public Health confirm widespread concern about sustaining already-lean enterprises in the face of H1N1-related absenteeism and supply chain issues.
Reality checks on vaccine, supply chain, telework issues
Among plenary and breakout sessions addressing such concerns are:
- Responding to H1N1 with vaccines and antivirals: cutting through the fog
- Preventing transmission in the workplace: discerning fact from fiction
- How three world-leading companies responded in the early days of H1N1
- Travel management: sharing policies and "trigger points" for restricting travel
- Dealing with differing "rules of the road" by city, county, state and country
- The impact of the pandemic on your supply chain: identifying and addressing gaps
The CIDRAP summit will focus on ensuring participants learn tips, tools and strategies they can put into action immediately. A complete roster of more than 50 speakers, the full agenda and registration information are available at the summit Web site.
Summit organizers, presenters and break-out session chairs include private- and public-sector preparedness experts whose pandemic plans were tested and adapted when the novel H1N1 pandemic broke out last spring and who are interested in sharing with peers successful practices, policies and tactics.
They include human resources, business continuity, supply chain, logistics, medical, public health, and government professionals from such organizations as FedEx, Target Corporation, Dell Inc., Mattel, The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, General Mills, Premier Inc., 3M, Hormel Foods Corporation, Monsanto Company, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), U.S. Department of Labor, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, International SOS, Harvard University, and many more.
Special tracks to address high demand on healthcare, human resources
Two industries have been singled out for separate tracks: healthcare and human resources, both of which experienced a surge in demand for their services during the spring outbreak.