In December 2008, before the first case of H1N1 pandemic influenza was discovered, Purdue University drafted a plan that outlines how essential and non-essential employees would access its campuses.
The plan, developed by Purdue's Pandemic Preparedness Committee, includes a useful appendix: Essential Function Staff Recommendation. The document provides a system of color-coding employee groups that may enhance public health and emergency preparedness planning.
As a part of its response to the H1N1 pandemic, the University of Illinois Infectious Disease Work Group, comprising representatives from across the university, tried to articulate how university employers should handle employee illness in a pandemic.
From 2006 until the outbreak of H1N1 in spring 2009, the University of Wisconsin Madison (UW-Madison) made pandemic influenza planning a priority for campus organizations and departments. In 2006, initial support for pandemic planning came directly from the Chancellor's office. Given that the University of Wisconsin Madison Police Department (UWPD) oversees emergency management on campus and that the Chief of Police is also an Associate Vice Chancellor, the UWPD became significantly involved in pandemic planning and H1N1 response.
This simple activity was completed as part of a pandemic influenza response tabletop exercise in March 2009. The activity was designed to illustrate how a pandemic could affect members of the Pandemic Influenza Response Team and to creatively build support for the need to identify three back-up employees for each response position.
This recommendations document was developed to provide education and guidance on the use of personal protective equipment (PPE) for H1N1 pandemic influenza in the face of confusing, and sometimes conflicting, guidance from federal agencies. Although questions about use of PPE surfaced early among some of our colleagues, the need to have clear and specific guidelines became evident as University of Minnesota (U of M) planners reviewed the quantities of stockpiled equipment they had available, as well as limited resources related to appropriate individual fit-testing for respirators.
The University of Minnesota developed a policy that outlines how the president or designee, in accordance with the University Emergency Operations Plan, may determine circumstances that would necessitate the declaration of a University State of Emergency, or change in standard operations, either to limit exposure through "social distancing," or as a result of extremely high rates of absenteeism, related to pandemic influenza.
