U.S. Health System Judged Unready For Large Nuclear Disaster

The U.S. health care system is not ready to handle the massive number of injuries and other demands that would follow from a large-scale radiation release, the Homeland Security Department determined last year. The finding comes after years of attention to the threat posed by potential terrorist detonation of a crude nuclear weapon or a radiological "dirty bomb," ProPublica reported on Thursday (see GSN, March 30).
"Current capabilities can only handle a few radiation injuries at a time," according to an unpublicized 2010 Homeland Security report. It states that "there is no strategy for notifying the public in real time of recommendations on shelter or evacuation priorities."