Simulation exercise: Foot and mouth disease in Australia-9

Dr Andy Carroll, Chief Veterinary Officer, Australian Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, informed the OIE that a simulation exercise, called “Exercise Loeffler”, will be run at CSIRO’s Australian Animal Health Laboratory (AAHL) in Victoria from 23 to 27 November 2009. The exercise will be conducted in the laboratory, with no field component.

It will consist of a series of modules which will test AAHL’s capability to deal with a hypothetical outbreak of foot and mouth disease (FMD). Approximately 40 members of AAHL’s staff will be involved in the exercise.

The overall aim of the exercise is to undertake modules that will adequately test the individual components of the organisation’s Emergency Animal Disease Response Plan.

The objectives of the exercise include: To identify and report against

• Depth of surge capacity of participants.
• Process bottlenecks.
• Resource limitations (capabilities).
• Procedural deficiencies in documentation used to guide processes.
• Knowledge and training gaps.
• Test performance.
• Compliance with standards and benchmarks.

The functional exercise will be held over five days and will be based on a hypothetical FMD outbreak in Victoria.

(*) CSIRO: Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation

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Animal Health Information Department
World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE)
[email protected]