Yukon Kuskokwim Nushagak science

The Fluwickie (see sidebar) has a listing of info in various languages, many of which are from the NZ/Aotearoa public health site.

• http://www.fluwikie.com/pmwiki.php?n=Consequences.Languages

Brochures, Getting ready for a flu pandemic
Posters, Stop the spread of flu germs

10% of our elders in Bethel speak Korean. Other Bethel languages include

Getting ready for a flu pandemic - Korean (PDF, 704 kB)
Getting ready for a flu pandemic - Hindi (PDF, 716 kB)
Getting ready for a flu pandemic - Samoan (PDF, 611 kB)
Getting ready for a flu pandemic - Arabic (PDF, 843 kB)

Of course, not everyone is literate in their spoken languages. International symbols, especially for mass diasters, would be essential.

As I mentioned in April 2006 to the editor, Delta Discovery–

Sometimes it is easy to overlook the great cultural wealth we have at hand in Bethel. For a city so small, we benefit so much from so many of us born overseas. They feed our spirits, feed our minds, feed our stomachs, feed our souls. I would like to thank the nurses, cab drivers, tellers, doctors, counsellors, teachers, preachers, restaurateurs, entrepreneurs, wives, elders, et al. who make our lives in Bethel richer.This is an incomplete list that would be interesting if others can add to it — Thank you, those born in

Albania
Argentina
Cameroon
Canada
China
Cyprus
former Czechoslovakia
El Salvador
France
India
Iran
Israel
Japan
Korea
Lebanon
Macedonia
Mexico
Montenegro
Nepal
perhaps New Zealand?
Nigeria
Peru
Philippines
Poland
Puerto Rico
Russia
Samoa/American Samoa
Saudi Arabia
former Yugoslavia

The major spoken languages in Bethel include Yup’ik, Cup’ik, and Inupiaq Eskimo; Athabascan, Russian, Spanish, French, Korean, Greek, Serbian, Farsi, English (also known as gussack, which itself is Russian in origin for non-Yup’ik speakers), …

Please add to the list.

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I don’t know if the regional school districts have any preparedness plans for regional or local disasters. Judging by the Hooper Bay fire, they don’t. The schools as an institution should be on the front-line of planning with the community. Schooling is an important tool for post-trauma resiliency. The school-in-a-box idea is important to consider if we do get shut off from the everyday routines due to a pandemic or flooding or storm surges. Or, school fire.

[In addition, the schools are often a very large beast in a small community when they operate independent to the community. For example, schools often require their own water supplies, diverting from the community’s sanitation facilities. Schools contribute relatively enormous amounts of solid waste, but don’t participate in community solid waste management. Schools contribute hazardous waste and air pollution to local communities, but are not participating in eliminating or reducing their impact.]

The written story and the audio story about UNICEF’s project is available from here

• http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6354084

NPR has also provided links to further information.

All Things Considered, October 20, 2006 ·
A year after a powerful earthquake devastated South Asia’s Kashmir region, UNICEF is providing a unique kind of emergency relief: its School-in-a-Box program.

Each aluminum box contains classroom supplies for up to 80 students, and 10,000 kits were distributed in Pakistan over the past year. The 110-pound boxes are often carried by donkeys or small boats.

The culturally neutral materials include writing utensils, notebooks, rulers, counting blocks and posters, says Ellen van Kamthout, UNICEF’s senior project officer for education in emergencies….

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If this chiller is approved it might be an excellent disaster preparation for remote areas like us. It runs on solar energy and can store the cold for several dark days. Cold is needed for blood samples (to identify an emerging illness), for some medicines, for environmental testing reagents, in addition to vaccines. Currently, if any of our Villages runs out of fuel oil, there are no other electrical sources. While others make jokes about selling freezers to Eskimos (freezers are vital in subsistence economies, even with traditional food storage techniques such as drying and fermenting) our region is too hot or too cold for delicate medicines.

From the excellent SciDevNet,

• http://tinyurl.com/veulx

Agency: United Nations Environment Programme

An innovative new solar-powered refrigeration technology developed by an alliance of seven international organisations, nongovernmental organisations and the private sector has won the prestigious 2006 Cooling Industry Awards in the environmental pioneer category for refrigeration. The SolarChill Vaccine Cooler and Refrigerator Project will enable vaccines to be stored in locations that lack an adequate electricity supply and thereby directly help improve the health of children in developing countries. “

Read more here

The SolarChill Vaccine Cooler and Refrigerator Project was the winner of the prestigious 2006 UK Cooling Industry Award in the Environmental Pioneer Refrigeration category at the October 4, 2006 Cooling Industry Award Ceremonies in London, England.

…SolarChill prototypes have been successfully field tested over an 18 month period, in Senegal, Indonesia and Cuba. At an ambient temperature of 32° Centigrade, the optimized prototypes maintained the required temperatures of 2° to 8° Centigrade under normal use, as well as a hold over temperature of 10° - 15° Centigrade for more than six days without any solar energy….

Since recommended equipment for storage of vaccines has to comply with a set of performance standards defined by WHO and UNICEF, the SolarChill technology has been submitted for WHO approval.

Once the SolarChill technology receives WHO approval, it will be made freely available to the world and will be publicly owned.

• http://www.solarchill.org/

Technorati Tags: appropriate+technology, solar+power, vaccine, refrigerator, SolarChill
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I mentioned this earlier

• Flu-Season Wealth of Vaccine - http://ykalaska.uniblogs.org/?p=287

but it needs to be emphasized. The public is needed to train the health professionals in handling community-wide emergencies.

Wear comfortable clothes and shoes and bring the family (even if all won’t be receiving a seasonal flu shot.

Where: National Guard Armory across from Dmitri’s Restaurant and ID Variety in Bethel

When: Saturday, October 28, 2006
10:00 AM to 6:00 PM

This should be the first in a series. A Village mass dispensing exercise is also planned, but when and where weren’t specifically mentioned on KYUK AM today (Hooper Bay?). Other Villages were invited by Public Health to request similar exercises.

Please participate, even if you don’t want a flu shot. We all need to practice for emergencies, as a community, and not wait for trial and errors when those matter most.

Katrina was no Girl Scout.

Read the entire story

• http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/16/us/16album.html

During the cold war, the battle line was drawn right here on the North Slope, with the Soviets skulking just across the Bering Strait. Most Alaska Guard members stayed in the state, protecting the home front.

But the world has changed. For this war, 670 Guard members have been called up from rural Alaska, its largest foreign deployment ever. The Alaska Guard estimates that one-third of its members are Eskimo, so most likely a third of those deployed are indigenous men, officials say, though the military does not keep official racial records of this type.

• more on Iraq effects - http://ykalaska.uniblogs.org/?p=207

• What impact will Iraq war call-up have - http://ykalaska.uniblogs.org/?p=203

Technorati Tags: Iraq, Eskimo, National+Guard, war, subsistence
Site Search Tags: Iraq, Eskimo, National+Guard, war, subsistence

It is important to send historical diseases back to the historical record. Adults and children need their immunizations.

Each Village has a health professional who can give shots. Vaccinations are also available in Bethel at Public Health, Family Clinic, or Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corp.

APRN Alaska News

Whooping cough cases on the rise in Southcentral [sic] Alaska
By Shane Iverson, KYUK

BETHEL, AK (2006-10-11) Confirmed cases of whooping cough are on the rise in southwestern parts of the state. Children under 12 months old are particularly at risk. But health officials say the key to preventing the spread of the disease is adult vaccinations.

• http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/apti/ news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=980093

listen to the story here–

• http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/apti/local-apti-534180.mp3

• Pandemic Flu Awareness Week, October 9 - 16, 2006 - http://scienceblogs.com/effectmeasure/2006/10/post_1.php

The Flu Wiki (previously mentioned) has links to resources. I find the feed very difficult to read for updates but otherwise I search for items of interest.

• The Flu Wiki - http://www.fluwikie.com/

• http://avianflutalk.com/

is another discussion board. The color design is impossible to read in a browser, but the feed is legible.

Site Search Tags: wiki, Effect+Measure

Because of the pandemic awareness, this was supposed to be the year of pushing seasonal flu immunization. Our flu vaccine only arrived towards the end of last week; last year we could get shots in September. (We seem to be among the earliest regions in the state or country to catch seasonal influenza.)

This year, flu shots have more than doubled in price through Alaska state Public Health, from $12 to $25 each. Fortunately, they do offer a sliding fee.

Public health will be practicing mass vaccination on Saturday, October 28, in Bethel (at the Armory). This is essential practice for an actual pandemic—how quickly can people be vaccinated? Flu shots will be free then.

For more info contact Public Health at 543-2110 or to make an appointment for a flu shot prior to the end of October.

[Read up on flu vaccine here,

• Pandemic presentation (Rashid Chotani, MD) - http://ykalaska.uniblogs.org/?p=126

]

In a Flu-Season Turnabout, Officials See Wealth of Vaccine

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON, Oct. 5 - After approving a fifth flu vaccine for sale, public health officials are predicting that for the first time in four years there will be abundant supplies of vaccine this season.

In all, four manufacturers are expected to make as much as 115 million doses this year, a record supply. That is up from just two manufacturers making about 61 million doses two years ago.

The turnaround is the culmination of a long effort by public health officials and vaccine manufacturers to recover from chronic flu-shot shortages that led to long lines at vaccine clinics across the United
States. For the last two years, health officials had instructed providers to give shots in the early weeks of the season only to those deemed at highest risk. Not so this year.

To read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/06/us/06flu.html Or: http://tinyurl.com/rsxqe

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Technorati Tags: flu+shot, seasonal+flu, vaccine
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Science 25 August 2006: Vol. 313. no. 5790, pp. 1088 - 1090
DOI: 10.1126/science.313.5790.1088

• http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/313/5790/1088

Desalination Freshens Up, by Robert F. Service
Efforts to provide clean, fresh water for the world’s inhabitants seem to be moving in the wrong direction. According to the World Health Organization, 1 billion people do not have access to clean, piped water. A World Resources Institute analysis adds that 2.3 billion people–41% of Earth’s population–live in water-stressed areas, a number expected to climb to 3.5 billion by 2025. To make matters worse, global population is rising by 80 million a year, and with it the demand for new sources of fresh water.

missing freshwater

The Yukon-Kuskowkim Rivers Delta, in the Bethel area, is a semi-arid region with generally 15 inches or less of precipitation per year. When last I checked, Bethel has about as much precipitation as Los Alamos, New Mexico in the high “desert”, including snow (54 inches).

The Kuskokwim Delta is aggrading (sinking or eroding away) instead of accreting (gaining sediment and area) as is the Yukon Delta. Unfortunately, I cannot find on-line the specific data and reports for the accretion or degrading status, nor analyses of possible causes. (If a reader knows this, please let the rest of us know.)

For at least a decade, the tundra ponds on the Kuskowkim delta have been disappearing—

• they may be sinking (the permafrost holding them up may be disappearing. Last year nearby ponds look like a bathtub with the plug pulled)
• the land may be rising (but we haven’t had the weight of glaciers above us in the past)
• the pattern of precipitation may have changed (more occurs in warmer months which may result in more evaporation)
• the amount of precipitation may have decreased
• people use much more water (especially on piped systems)
• there are many more people using water
• sea level may be changing (fresh water floats on top of salt water)

No matter the cause, we do not seem to have now, and will likely not have for the next generation, sufficient water clean enough for essential uses.

There was quite a bit packed into an hour because it was well-organized, but easy to follow. You can follow along to compare whether (or what types of) preparedness has or has not been done locally. For example, I haven’t seen or heard anything about the ethics of who will receive scarce treatments; we know from the Hooper Bay fire news stories that very few if any schools have an emergency plan which has been tested. Have any of the businesses (besides Corinna’s) looked to see if there will be sufficient sanitation supplies on hand? Lynden Cargo is about our only source of fresh foods and mail. What will they do if the airport is closed for several weeks or their staff is ill? Another question, although this is the year designated for maximum seasonal influenza immunizations and education, how come we are so late in getting the vaccine?

Pandemic Flu Preparedness: What Every Community Should Know

• http://publichealthgrandrounds.unc.edu/pandemic/

September 29, 2006, 2:00 - 3:00 pm ET

An online discussion forum will begin September 29 and end on October 6. Come back here after the program to ask questions and share your best practices.

• Join the discussion. - https://instruct.unc.edu/wcb/schools/5/4601/bhart/PubRoun27061/forums/forum1/wwwboard.html

• Go to the webcast - http://publichealthgrandrounds.unc.edu/pandemic/webcast_od.htm

• Go to the closed caption webcast - http://publichealthgrandrounds.unc.edu/pandemic/webcast_od_cc.htm

16 AUGUST 2006 | BANGKOK — World-famous actor and martial arts expert Jackie Chan stars in a new television public service announcement to alert children and their families around the world to the dangers of highly pathogenic avian influenza, or bird flu….

The PSA was produced by the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO), with funding from the Government of Japan….
The children in the PSA, ranging in age from 6 to 9, were filmed at Sha Tin Junior School in Hong Kong….

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/notes/2006/ jackie_chan/en/index.html

Streaming video or to order–

http://tinyurl.com/gtvj4

Site Search Tags: video, television, PSAs, UN

Guardsmen will patrol fire-ravaged village
HOOPER BAY: Calls to police are surging in charred community.

By ALEX deMARBAN, Anchorage Daily News
Published: August 10, 2006, Last Modified: August 10, 2006 at 03:37 AM

Alaska National Guard soldiers, with help from some volunteers, will help maintain order in the fire-ravaged village of Hooper Bay.

Police in the Southwest Alaska village of 1,133 are facing a surge in calls since the massive Aug. 3 fire, Police Chief James Hoelscher said Wednesday.

Hooper Bayers are panicky, and rightfully so — especially if they see kids playing with matches, he said.”
….
Four volunteers with the Alaska State Defense Force, civilians who assist during emergencies under the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, will help police shoo kids from the dangerous piles of twisted metal rising from the soot where the fire raged, Hoelscher said.

Seven guardsmen will help patrol the village and keep the peace….

http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/rural/story/8062331p-7955268c.html

Site Search Tags: Iraq, Guard, children, cleanup, Hooper Bay

Pandemic Flu Preparedness: What Every Community Should Know
September 29, 2006, 2:00 - 3:00 pm ET
A National Satellite Broadcast & Webcast, Site registration will begin August 21
[deadline]

It’s just an hour, but maybe will have links and readings posted.

“Public Health Grand Rounds is a series of satellite broadcasts and webcasts presenting real-world case studies on public health issues ranging from obesity to bioterrorism, from SARS to food safety.”

http://www.publichealthgrandrounds.unc.edu/index.htm

Site Search Tags: deadline, broadcast, webcast

I would do it sooner and prepare for longer in rural and remote areas. But it is a first step to start now.

Take the next 24 weeks and build a 7 Day Survival Kit!

Some find it difficult to put together a disaster preparedness kit, but using this easy-to-follow Preparedness Supplies Calendar will help you and your family take the anxiety and frustration out of preparing for emergencies or disasters by ensuring you have enough supplies to last seven days or until help arrives.

http://www.ak-prepared.com/homelandsecurity/pdf/7_Day_Supply_Calendar.pdf

Other planning guides here

http://www.ak-prepared.com/homelandsecurity/citizenpreparedness.htm

The City of Bethel did not participate.

State Pandemic Influenza Summits

One of the major issues discussed at the summit was stockpiling of antivirals and personal protective equipment (PPE). Alaska has only 24 hospitals and 1400 hospital beds, which serve 300 communities. Some of these communities are not on the road system and are only accessible by airplane. It is therefore imperative for these isolated communities to have access to antivirals and PPE before a pandemic closes transportation routes. Alaska plans to stockpile these items in a centralized location, and will move the supplies to regional hub communities if and when the WHO elevates the pandemic alert phase.

Throughout the summer, the state Department of Health and Social Services, in cooperation with partners in the state homeland security agency and the tribal health system, will conduct a statewide outreach program in 15 hub communities across Alaska. This program will assist with the development or revision of local emergency plans to support response to a pandemic, and will include tabletop exercises to help local responders assess their readiness. [emphasis added]

2006 Association of State and Territorial Health Officials Issue Report: State Pandemic Influenza Summits
State Pandemic Influenza Summits: Building Partnerships for Pandemic Preparedness
Retrieved 2006 July 28 from http://www.ASTHO.org Pandemic Preparedness Report.

Site Search Tags: Alaska, Bethel, rural, disaster

http://www.helpage.org/Resources/Manuals#1118336526-0-10
Older people in disasters and humanitarian crises: Guidelines for best practice

Ageways is a semi-annual publication from HelpAge International HelpAge.org. It has much we can learn from the so-called Third World. Their entry page for emergencies is here

http://www.helpage.org/Emergencies

Site Search Tags:
elderly
aging
elders
senior+citizen
checklist
guidelines

This photo of the flames nearing the bulk fuel tanks was taken earlier this morning. The existing school is totally destroyed. Currently, the weather is good— it is not sub-zero; neither Bethel airport or Hooper Bay are fog-bound; it is not the autumn gales.

When the crisis slows, I hope the Village will let us know what they found worked and what didn’t work in their response plans.

Ironically, since April, the state has been waiting for the City of Bethel to host a preparedness exercise that would also involve all the other Villages in our region (the state is only doing regional meetings). The City didn’t respond. In early June, the Bethel Fire Chief and other leaders said publicly that there was no need to do disaster planning except at the airport—

• we are not unprepared
• dispatcher must have been new
• we’ve done it before
• we survived
• will be tough but we shelter our own
• we have food on the shelves
• we have the oil tank farm
• we make our own water
• we have electricity
• Katrina? that was Louisiana

Fire still raging in Hooper Bay
By ALEX deMARBAN, Anchorage Daily News
Published: August 3, 2006, Last Modified: August 3, 2006 at 11:56 AM

A state forestry helicopter that scoops water from lakes is on its way to the Western Alaska village of Hooper Bay to help fight a raging fire that’s destroyed the elementary school, teacher housing and up to 10 private homes, state officials said.

At least 250 people have been evacuated from threatened homes. The helicopter, from McGrath, should arrive early this afternoon.

Public Safety Commissioner Bill Tandeske says the school and nearby buildings have burned to the ground and ten homes have also burned.

Officials with the Alaska National Guard say a grocery store has caught fire and dozens of other buildings, including city hall, are threatened…

Volunteer firefighters from the larger community of Bethel, about 154 miles southeast, are also flying to Hooper Bay to fight the fire, officials said….

http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/rural/story/8036906p-7930027c.html

http://www.ak-prepared.com/plans/mitigation/

Unfortunately, nearly everything is hard to find and the checklists are not well presented (why does a state of Alaska site have a dot com URL instead of dot gov?).

Basic Template for Alaska Small Community/Tribal Emergency Operations Plans
Alaska Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, 1 Jan 2006 This document is a basic template for emergency operations plans for Alaskan communities developed by state homeland security officials. Small Community Model Plan Acrobat Reader Version

The MS Word format is more useful, Small Community Model Plan MS Word Version

The ways in which communities govern themselves differ widely throughout Alaska. Rural communities are often incorporated as cities, but not always. Native communities may instead choose to be governed by a tribal council. Yet others may be governed by a non-profit community association. Most native communities also have a village corporation. Each of these organizations usually owns assets needed in an emergency response. They should agree to work in unison to prevent, prepare for, respond to and recover from emergencies and disasters. This template presumes that to be the case.

….How would the YK Delta respond to a pandemic?

In preparation for the possibility of a pandemic, organizations in the YK Delta have joined together to plan a coordinated response.

These organizations include the Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation, the Association of Village Council Presidents, Bethel Regional Public Health Center, Bethel Family Clinic, other departments from the State of Alaska, and local emergency responders.

Our goal is to keep the people of the YK Delta informed with the most accurate information about any developments or risks associated with the H5N1 “bird flu” or any other possible pandemic that could impact the people of the YK Delta. In the event of a pandemic, our planning committee is focused on assuring a coordinated response and recovery to our villages in the YK Delta….

Read the entire article in the

YKHC Messenger, July 15, 2006
http://www.ykhc.org/1250.cfm

Because our birds fly way south for winter…

Regional action plan for avian flu, Tuesday, July 25, 2006

THE Sectretariat of the Pacific Community has been tasked with drafting an action plan in the event a human case of the avian influenza is reported in the region.

This was resolved at the weeklong meeting in Nadi this week which focuses on the implementation of the Pacific Regional Influenza Pandemic Preparedness Plan.

http://www.fijitimes.com/story.aspx?id=45318

http://www.spc.int/lrd/index.htm

…The aim of the project is to establish immediate measures to prevent and/or respond to a possible outbreak of avian influenza and pandemic human influenza in the region. The focus will be on building capacity within Pacific Island countries for surveillance and diagnosis of avian influenza, and other emerging diseases, and emergency response planning. Activities will cover both public and animal health….

“In the Pacific, human influenza outbreaks can happen at any time of the year, being more influenced by the flow of people from temperate regions than by the local climate. Many islands are visited by large numbers of tourists and there is the potential for new strains of influenza to be transported back to Pacific Island communities in the Northern and Southern hemispheres….

Although there is no certainty that an influenza pandemic will occur, it is a potentially serious threat that must be addressed. The Pacific is vulnerable to the introduction of pandemic influenza through the movement of people, migratory birds and legal and illegal trade in poultry and poultry products. To respond to such a threat, Pacific Island countries need effective preparedness plans and the resources and capacity to implement them. While some countries have developed, or are in the process of developing preparedness plans, and some surveillance and laboratory capacity, none of these have been tested for a pandemic scenario. The priorities identified by regional governments include improved surveillance, development and testing of plans, strengthened public health measures, and inclusion of more sectors/stakeholders in planning and implementation.”

Site Search Tags: Polynesia, Pacific+Island

This is an interesting read about a previous pandemic of avian influenza. Note the impact of behavioral change on the epidemiology of the disease and why the disease would affect people differently in St Louis from Philadelphia.

It is a good example of why histories from that era (and later pandemics like the 1960s out here) are so important to record, study, and learn from. I encourage every reader to collect those stories. And to compare what is learned from the past with contemporary planning
Read the rest of this entry »

printed in the Anchorage Daily News which I don’t think intended this to be satire.

http://www.adn.com/life/health/birdflu/story/7939198p-7832627c.html

By MARY PEMBERTON, The Associated Press
Published: July 7, 2006

Alaska is taking an aggressive stance against a possible outbreak of deadly bird flu in humans by placing its order early for medicines intended to slow the spread of a pandemic.

State officials will eventually order enough antiviral doses to cover about a fourth of Alaska residents.

Officials are being bold because the state is a crossroads for migratory birds, which could be carrying the virus here from other parts of the world….

“If we get to 2007, we will be on our road of having a reasonable supply,” Mandsager said….

State health officials this summer will come up with a map for distributing the drugs quickly if there is an outbreak. The plan calls for moving some of the antivirals from Anchorage to cities and towns such as Bethel, Nome and Kotzebue, and eventually to the villages.

“It won’t do any good to have the medicine if we don’t have a distribution plan,” Mandsager said…. emphasis added

With regard to antivirals as effective agents against an H5N1 human pandemic—see discussions here:

from EffectMeasure [It’s not the plan, it’s the planning. - http://ykalaska.uniblogs.org/2006/04/14/ its-not-the-plan-its-the-planning/]
“But an important issue raised by the IAFF (echoed by health care workers) is policy around prophylaxis of essential workers.”
http://effectmeasure.blogspot.com/ 2006/04/firefighters-and-bird-flu.html

Bird Flu: Communicating the Risk, Sandman & Lanard - http://ykalaska.uniblogs.org/2006/03/21/h5n1-risk-sandman/

Previous post — What impact will Iraq war call-up have
http://ykalaska.uniblogs.org/2006/06/27/ what-impact-will-iraq-war-call-up-have/

Jody has a nice quiet story this morning about a disquieting deployment into the Iraq war.

Alaska Communities Struggle with National Guard Deployments

Listen to this story… by Jody Seitz

Morning Edition, July 4, 2006 · National Guard deployments to Iraq are drawing on a unique population of older Guard members in Alaska. The absence of these men from their communities poses distinct challenges to families already stressed by the high price of energy, the lack of jobs and, in some communities, the loss of municipal services. Jody Seitz of member station KDLG reports.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5532219

Other NPR (National Public Radio) stories can be found here

http://tinyurl.com/gz3jh

Site Search Tags: Iraq, Guard, war

http://tinyurl.com/ggg9o

Eskimo Troops Brace for Iraq
Alaskan Guard units are called up for the first time in decades. Villages worry about losing men.
By Sam Howe Verhovek, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

June 5, 2006
KONGIGANAK, Alaska

….In this village of 386 people, six men have been notified to report for duty next month. ..The call-up in the marshy delta country to the west reaches villages so remote that there are only two ways to get here most of the year — by airplane or snowmobile — and a third from May to September, or perhaps October in a warm year with a late freeze-up: the river.

So in places with Eskimo names such as Kongiganak, Kwigillingok and Manokotak, elder leaders and wives find themselves planning how to carry on without strong young men who serve as vital providers of food….

===========================================
I did some calculations to see what numerical impact (and ultimately biocultural impact) the call-up will have.
Read the rest of this entry »

Wed Jun 14, 2006 8:55 AM IST163
By Yereth Rosen

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - A new Alaskan law increases the state’s power to test and quarantine animals suspected of carrying contagious diseases, a precaution that officials say will be necessary in the case of a deadly strain of bird flu.

Alaska Gov. Frank Murkowski signed the bill on Tuesday that expands animal-control rules largely unchanged since 1949.

The new law widens the state’s authority during a public health risk to test all animals for all diseases.

The old law limited testing to livestock, commercial poultry and animals raised on the fur farms that once dotted Alaska’s islands and coastal areas, state officials said.

“We know today’s diseases cross the boundaries between wild animals, domesticated animals and people,” said Alaska State Veterinarian Bob Gerlach.”…

http://tinyurl.com/p6vdm