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Strategic National Stockpile
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Strategic National Stockpile
The Strategic National Stockpile (SNS), originally called the National Pharmaceutical Stockpile (NPS), is the United States' national repository of antibiotics, vaccines, chemical antidotes, antitoxins, and other critical medical supplies. Its website states:
"The Strategic National Stockpile's role is to supplement state and local supplies during public health emergencies. Many states have products stockpiled, as well. The supplies, medicines, and devices for life-saving care contained in the stockpile can be used as a short-term stopgap buffer when the immediate supply of adequate amounts of these materials may not be immediately available."
The actual supply of drugs and supplies that make up the SNS are located in 12 secret locations strategically placed throughout the US. The locations appear to look like ordinary commercial warehouses. Inside the warehouses, supplies are stacked on shelves that can measure five stories high. Armed personnel guard the warehouse contents and, according to NPR in 2020, during the COVID-19 global pandemic, "rows of ventilators, which can support people who are having trouble breathing, are kept charged up and ready to roll at a moment's notice."
The SNS holds a variety of items that would be helpful to the general population in the event of a widespread disease outbreak.[citation needed]
Each push pack weighs about 50 short tons (100,000 lb; 45 t; 45,000 kg). Its contents include broad-spectrum oral and intravenous antibiotics, emergency medicines, IV fluids and kits, airway equipment, bandages, vaccines, antitoxins, and ventilators. The material deploys by unmarked trucks and airplanes within 12 hours of the receipt of a request by the CDC. The U.S. Marshals Service provides armed security from these federal sites to local destinations. The SNS has adequate vaccines and countermeasures in its stockpile, including 300 million smallpox treatment courses and enough anthrax vaccines to handle a three-city incident.
CHEMPACKs contain nerve agent antidotes to help in the event of a nerve agent attack or industrial accident. As of 2015, 1,960 CHEMPACKs were forward-deployed in more than 1,340 locations across every state and territory of the United States.
During the first decade of the Cold War, the United States accumulated a civil defense medical stockpile at 32 storage facilities. The supplies began to degrade in the 1960s, and were disposed of and the stockpile program closed in 1974.
In April 1998, President Bill Clinton read the Richard Preston novel The Cobra Event, a fiction book about a mad scientist spreading a virus throughout New York City. As a result, Clinton held a meeting with scientists and cabinet officials to discuss the threat of bioterrorism. He was so impressed that he asked the experts to meet with senior-level aides at the Department of Defense and in the Department of Health and Human Services. At that time, the government had stockpiles of medications for military personnel, but did not have them for civilians. Shortly after, The Washington Post wrote that Clinton surprised many in Washington at how fast he and his National Security Council had moved to change that. By October, Clinton signed into law a new budget of $51 million for prescription drugs and vaccine stockpiling to be carried out by the CDC.
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Strategic National Stockpile
The Strategic National Stockpile (SNS), originally called the National Pharmaceutical Stockpile (NPS), is the United States' national repository of antibiotics, vaccines, chemical antidotes, antitoxins, and other critical medical supplies. Its website states:
"The Strategic National Stockpile's role is to supplement state and local supplies during public health emergencies. Many states have products stockpiled, as well. The supplies, medicines, and devices for life-saving care contained in the stockpile can be used as a short-term stopgap buffer when the immediate supply of adequate amounts of these materials may not be immediately available."
The actual supply of drugs and supplies that make up the SNS are located in 12 secret locations strategically placed throughout the US. The locations appear to look like ordinary commercial warehouses. Inside the warehouses, supplies are stacked on shelves that can measure five stories high. Armed personnel guard the warehouse contents and, according to NPR in 2020, during the COVID-19 global pandemic, "rows of ventilators, which can support people who are having trouble breathing, are kept charged up and ready to roll at a moment's notice."
The SNS holds a variety of items that would be helpful to the general population in the event of a widespread disease outbreak.[citation needed]
Each push pack weighs about 50 short tons (100,000 lb; 45 t; 45,000 kg). Its contents include broad-spectrum oral and intravenous antibiotics, emergency medicines, IV fluids and kits, airway equipment, bandages, vaccines, antitoxins, and ventilators. The material deploys by unmarked trucks and airplanes within 12 hours of the receipt of a request by the CDC. The U.S. Marshals Service provides armed security from these federal sites to local destinations. The SNS has adequate vaccines and countermeasures in its stockpile, including 300 million smallpox treatment courses and enough anthrax vaccines to handle a three-city incident.
CHEMPACKs contain nerve agent antidotes to help in the event of a nerve agent attack or industrial accident. As of 2015, 1,960 CHEMPACKs were forward-deployed in more than 1,340 locations across every state and territory of the United States.
During the first decade of the Cold War, the United States accumulated a civil defense medical stockpile at 32 storage facilities. The supplies began to degrade in the 1960s, and were disposed of and the stockpile program closed in 1974.
In April 1998, President Bill Clinton read the Richard Preston novel The Cobra Event, a fiction book about a mad scientist spreading a virus throughout New York City. As a result, Clinton held a meeting with scientists and cabinet officials to discuss the threat of bioterrorism. He was so impressed that he asked the experts to meet with senior-level aides at the Department of Defense and in the Department of Health and Human Services. At that time, the government had stockpiles of medications for military personnel, but did not have them for civilians. Shortly after, The Washington Post wrote that Clinton surprised many in Washington at how fast he and his National Security Council had moved to change that. By October, Clinton signed into law a new budget of $51 million for prescription drugs and vaccine stockpiling to be carried out by the CDC.