Americans Suspicious of Terror Plans, Survey Shows

Reuters | September 15 2004

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Most Americans would not cooperate as officials expect during a terror incident such as a smallpox or dirty bomb attack, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.

An in-depth survey found that the people do not trust the federal government to take care of them during an attack, and would take many matters into their own hands -- endangering themselves and their families.

Only two-fifths of those surveyed would follow instructions to go to a public vaccination site in a smallpox outbreak and only three-fifths would stay in a building other than their home after a dirty bomb explosion, the study found.

But a little more planning, and working with communities, may help improve emergency plans, leading to better cooperation, the team sponsored by the New York Academy of Medicine found.

If the survey's predictions are true, said Sherry Glied, chair of the department of health policy at Columbia University in New York, "our plans will fail."

The study looked at how people would react to two hypothetical scenarios -- a smallpox outbreak and a dirty bomb explosion.

Smallpox is a highly infectious virus that killed about 30 percent of victims. It was wiped out in 1979 with global vaccination, and people born after 1972 are not likely to have been vaccinated against it.

A dirty bomb would use a conventional explosion to spread radioactive material.

Current plans call for vaccination as needed during a smallpox attack, and for keeping people inside buildings until the danger from a dirty bomb had passed.

MAKING LOGICAL CHOICES

The researchers conducted in-depth discussions with government and private-sector planners, with community residents from around the country, and did a national telephone survey of 2,545 randomly selected adults.

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