Prevent Cooking Fires: Watch What You Heat” will be the theme for Fire Prevention Week 2006, October 8-14. In making the announcement, the National Fire Protection Association, sponsor of Fire Prevention Week for more than 80 years, notes that cooking fires cause the greatest number of home fires and injuries in the country annually. Additional information is atwww.firepreventionweek.org/.
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) has reported that “the nation’s emergency care system is fragmented and stretched to the breaking point, as well as severely compromised in its ability to handle disasters.” Dr. Rick Blum, president of the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP), said the reports prepared on the state of the system call for a “more patient-focused system” and the “end to the gridlock in emergency departments.”
A three-year study of the problems in the nation’s emergency system has shown that “only a tiny fraction of federal funding for emergency preparedness since 9/11 has been spent on medical preparedness”-4 percent of $3.38 billion distributed by the Department of Homeland Security for emergency preparedness in 2002 and 2003 and 5 percent of the funding from the Bioterrorism Hospital Preparedness Program.
If you are a current subscriber,login hereto access this content.
If you would like to become a subscriber, please visit ushere.
