Critical Releases in Homeland Security: May 20, 2009

"This compilation tells the story of the creation and the organizational history of the first five years of the Department of Homeland Security through its founding documents. These documents include legislation, executive orders, commission reports and recommendations, reorganization plans, presidential directives, speeches, and organization charts. Access to most of the documents is through links. Organization charts and select documents are included in the actual text. Before the establishment of the Department of Homeland Security, homeland security activities were spread across more than 40 federal agencies and an estimated 2,000 separate Congressional appropriations accounts. In February 2001, the U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century (Hart-Rudman Commission) issued its Phase III Report, recommending significant and comprehensive institutional and procedural changes throughout the executive and legislative branches in order to meet future national security challenges. Among these recommendations was the creation of a new National Homeland Security Agency to consolidate and refine the missions of the different departments and agencies that had a role in U.S. homeland security."

"An influenza pandemic is projected to have a global impact requiring a sustained, large-scale response from the healthcare community to provide care to sick patients. Healthcare workers will be at very high risk of becoming infected when caring for patients with pandemic flu unless adequate health and safety measures are in place, in advance of the pandemic, that will protect them. There is no existing comprehensive federal OSHA standard with mandatory and enforceable provisions that require planning and preparation designed to protect healthcare workers from exposures to pandemic influenza. Nevertheless, it is essential that workplaces plan and prepare for safety and health issues before the flu arrives. In an effort to assess the extent of employer efforts in planning adequate safety and health measures for healthcare workers, a group of unions developed a 'pandemic flu preparedness survey' to assess the level of preparedness on a facility basis. The survey was distributed to union leaders across the country who represent healthcare workers in unionized facilities. One hundred four (104) facility surveys were collected by six unions in fourteen states. The results of the survey indicate that health care facilities have made some progress in preparing for an influenza pandemic but much more needs to be done. More than one-third of the respondents believe their workplace is either not ready or only slightly ready to address the health and safety needs necessary to protect healthcare workers during a pandemic."

"Human activities are yielding rising atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases and other gases and particulates and are also greatly altering the Earth's land cover. A scientific consensus has emerged that those activities, if allowed to continue unabated, will have extensive, highly uncertain, but potentially serious and costly impacts on regional climates and ocean conditions throughout the world. This Congressional Budget Office (CBO) paper-prepared at the request of the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources-presents an overview of the current understanding of the impacts of climate change in the United States, emphasizing the wide range of uncertainty about the magnitude and timing of those impacts and the implications of that uncertainty for the formulation of effective policy responses. The analysis draws from numerous published sources to summarize the current state of climate science and provide a conceptual framework for addressing climate change as an economic concern. In keeping with CBO's mandate to provide objective, impartial analysis, the paper makes no recommendations."