DHS Draft Mass Chemical Incident Patient Decon Guidance

Today the DHS Office of Health Affairs (OHA) published a notice in the Federal Register (79 FR 18570) announcing the publication of a draft of the “Patient Decontamination in a Mass Chemical Exposure Incident: National Planning Guidance for Communities”. OHA is seeking comments on the draft guidance.

The notice describes this draft document as:

This guidance document is developed for senior leaders, planners, incident commanders, emergency management personnel and trainers of local response organizations and health care facilities; it contains strategic-level, evidence-based best practices for use when planning and conducting patient decontamination in a mass chemical casualty event. The subject matter is focused on external decontamination of living people exposed to toxic industrial chemicals (TICs), toxic industrial materials (TIMs) or chemical warfare agents (CWAs) resulting from either an intentional or accidental release. 

Public comments are being solicited. Comments may be filed via the Federal eRulemaking Portal (www.Regulations.gov; Docket # DHS-2014-0012). Comments must be submitted by May 19, 2014.

Unfortunately, the notice does not provide a link to the guidance. There is nothing on the OHA web site. And there is nothing currently in the Regulations.gov docket. As I noted in an earlier blog post, there is an earlier limited-circulation draft document, but since this is almost two years old, I suspect that some changes have already probably been made.

NOTE: Updated 10:50 CDT 4-2-14 – A copy of the Draft is now available on the Regulations.gov site.

OMB Approves Chemical Defense Project ICR

The Office of Management and Budget announced yesterday that it had approved the information collection request (ICR) for the DHS Office of Health Affairs (OHA) Chemical Defense Program. This ICR would allow the OHA to collect application information for proposed demonstration project aimed at developing a comprehensive chemical defense framework.

The announcement notes that the approval was made ‘with change’. The only change actually noted was that OMB approved the ICR for eighteen months rather than the requested (and standard) months. No reason was given for the change.

While there is nothing on the OHA web site about this program I know that demonstration projects have already been undertaken. The classic example is the Boston subway chemical dispersion project of a couple of years ago. I have already discussed some of the projects that I would like to see addressed in this program in my post on the 60-day ICR submission.

Copies of the project submission form can be downloaded from the OMB site (since OHA does not make them available on line). State, Local, Tribal and Territorial (SLTT) agencies may submit the completed form to CAPT Joselito Ignacio (joselito.ignacio@hq.dhs.gov).

NOTE: Congress is considering extending this small ($0.8 million) program in the current DHS funding bill.