Funding threatens state health depts.

WASHINGTON, Dec. 15 (UPI) -- The economic crisis is threatening to erode progress state health departments have made in preparing for public health emergencies, U.S. researchers say.

Robert M. Pestronk, executive director of the National Association of County and City Health Officials, says the Trust for America's Health's annual report card on states' ability to respond to such emergencies warns that the decade of progress made since the Sept. 11, 2001, and anthrax tragedies is threatened by a lack of funding.

From January 2008 to December 2009, local health departments lost 23,000 jobs to layoffs and attrition, roughly 15 percent of the entire local health department workforce. In the second half of 2009, 13,000 local health department employees were subjected to reduced hours or mandatory furloughs.

"As the report reveals, under very challenging circumstances state and local health departments have made progress. Yet, this report highlights serious gaps in our nation's ability to respond to health crises, from outbreaks of infectious disease to natural disasters," Pestronk says in a statement. "Unfortunately, a lack of federal, state, and local budget resources is straining an already fragile public health system. Because the first response to any public health emergency is a local one, we are concerned the federal failure to sustain public health preparedness funding at the state and local level will jeopardize future response."