Ridge Outlines Academic Medicine's Role in Homeland Security

Department of Homeland Security director Tom Ridge addresses AAMC's Executive council at its February meeting in Washington, D.C.

U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge addressed the AAMC's Executive Council during its February meeting in Washington, D.C. During his speech, he focused on ways academic medicine could be integrated into the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) initiatives and programs and promised to deliver information about funding for medical first responders.

For the first time, Ridge said the department is collecting homeland security plans from each state, including details about which groups each jurisdiction denotes as first responders to terrorist attacks. All 50 states have submitted plans and are currently being reviewed. Ridge pointed out that the plans would be used as the basis for allocating federal funds for first responders. He added that according to the Department of Health and Human Services, almost half of the approximately $1.9 billion appropriated has not been distributed to individual states. Ridge made a commitment to get back to the AAMC, once the department has analyzed the information, and report on the references made to the roles of medical schools and teaching hospitals in the state plans.

"We haven't integrated hospitals and healthcare systems as best we could have," Ridge said. "As we look toward new projects, we will look to include the healthcare community in a much more vigorous way."

During a question-and-answer session, AAMC members in attendance expressed their concern for foreign medical students studying in the United States on J-1 visas. Some institutions have warned these students not to travel outside the country because they run the risk of being denied re-entry. Ridge viewed that advice as erroneous and promised to discuss the issue with DHS officials. He added that he would pass along the outcomes of those discussions so that professors and administrators can provide the correct information to their students.

"We have to keep our borders open because we benefit enormously from the presence of these students," he said. "The notion of being a foreign-trained doctor and to go back to your country and save lives - there is no bigger contribution that America can make."

In addition to this effort, Ridge talked about a few other programs affecting academic medicine, including the Student and Exchange Visitor Program. Acknowledging its poor performance during its first year (2002), Ridge said, the department has improved coordination with universities to preserve a safe, multicultural atmosphere on campuses nationwide. The program monitors foreign visitors who come to the United States for higher education. Nearly 200 immigrants were denied entry in 2003 because they were not actually registered for classes as they claimed.

"The multicultural nature of our colleges and universities is important - it's a quality we need to maintain," he said.

Ridge also mentioned the DHS's Scholars and Fellows Program, which is in its second year. The program is for students who wish to study any of the sciences integral to homeland defense and protection. A total of 50 undergraduate and 50 graduate students are chosen each year to study either physical, biological, behavioral, or social sciences with monetary assistance from the department. They then apply their know- ledge to either science policy, engineering, mathematics, or computer science.

Ensuring the medical community is a partner in DHS's Bio-Surveillance Program Initiative has now become a high priority, whether the threat is natural or man-made, Ridge said. In the fiscal year 2005 budget, President Bush allocated $274 million that will be used by both Ridge and Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson to bolster the public health infrastructure in preparation for a bioterrorist attack.

During his address, Ridge discussed how the department is taking a page from the Department of Defense's playbook by developing the Security Advanced Research Project Agency (SARPA) - a program that focuses on new research and technologies that can be applied to various DHS endeavors, such as analyzing a location that is possibly infected with a biological agent. SARPA gathers the best information available within three hours of identifying the biological agent and maps out the quickest possible evacuation paths.

DHS is also in the early stages of developing technology that would improve upon an existing system under the direction of the Environmental Protection Agency. Although it is still a nascent project, Ridge said, the Biowatch Program is designed to make our air safer and healthier to breathe. When implemented, the technology will scan for and identify biopathogens and bioagents that are currently considered potential terrorism threats.

Finally, one AAMC member raised a concern about penalties that could be weighed against doctors who cross state lines during a crisis to provide medical care. Ridge said the department had no definitive answer on how the federal government will handle this situation should the need ever arise. But he added that the department was working to accommodate the state licensure issue so it will not be a future hindrance. n

-Whitney L.J. Howell

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