Prepare: Elements of an emergency preparedness plan
to treat sick animals. Maintaining the awareness of livestock-keepers and traders of the risks and their obligations to report (and how to do so) is a vital part of the early detection system.
Updating disease plans Preparedness plans, contingency plans, recovery plans and operations manuals should not be treated as static documents. They should be regarded as living documents that need to be regularly reviewed and updated as warranted by changing circumstances and technical knowledge. To assist in this approach, documents might be prepared in forms that are readily updated and a document identification process used to track the “current versions”. In reviewing and updating plans, the following factors should be taken into account: • changing epidemiological situations, both within the country and externally; • new disease threats; • any deficiencies highlighted in simulation exercises; • the results of new risk analyses; • new scientific findings or technological advances (e.g. better diagnostic methods or vaccines, new techniques related to culling of animals in outbreaks); • experiences in previous equivalent outbreaks in the country and other countries; • changes in the structure of livestock industries or methods of livestock husbandry, and internal or export trade requirements; • new standards, guidelines and recommendations by international organizations such as the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) or OIE; • changes in national legislation or in the structure or capabilities of government veterinary services (or other government instrumentalities); and • feedback from major stakeholders, including farmers. Risk analyses may also show that new emergency diseases have come to the fore, and highlight the need to prepare a new set of contingency plans for these new high-threat diseases. It may be useful to consider the capabilities of the veterinary and other relevant services as preparations are made. The OIE Performance of Veterinary Services Pathway, which corresponds to a global programme for the sustainable development of a country’s veterinary service’s compliance with OIE standards on the quality of veterinary services, provides one good tool for achieving such a review.
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