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HHS: guidance for trucking in event of flu outbreak; vaccine coming soon

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has issued interim guidance for trucking companies operating during an outbreak of pandemic influenza. The guidance is meant to educate management about precautions and appropriate work practices to minimize exposure and prevent workplace-related transmission of flu.

The guidelines were developed for three main segments of the trucking industry (government carriers, private fleets and for-hire carriers) but are applicable to all types of carriers. According to the guidance, during a pandemic it is likely that up to 40 percent of a workforce could be absent at any given time. Because of the importance of maintaining trucking operations, HHS encourages businesses to both implement a continuity of operations plan (COOP) and to educate their employees about standard precautions to minimize the risk of transmission.

HHS has worked worked with the American Trucking Associations in developing such a plan, the lobbying group stated on its Web site. The guidance focuses on health education that, properly implemented, “can significantly deter pandemic flu infection” and include social distancing, frequent hand washing and use of personal protective equipment on both healthy and possibly infected workers.

Continuing operations measures include maintaining all essential services, functions, and processes required to sustain essential business operations; prioritizing critical customers given their value to sustaining the business and the community; prioritizing business services and functions based on their value to essential customers and the community; and identifying potential “non-essential” services, functions, and processes that can be suspended or adapting to other more essential uses.

In related  news, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said upwards of 50 million doses of a new vaccine for the H1N1 virus will be available in mid-October, earlier than expected, with millions more doses quickly following, news sources reported.

The initial vaccines will go to what Sebelius calls "priority populations" — caregivers, young people ages 6 to 24, hospital workers, pregnant women and some seniors. They add up to about 160 million people, or nearly half the U.S. population.

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