Federal officials were well-prepared last week when the swine flu scare hit the United States; after all, they had plenty of experience from previous outbreaks of SARS and avian flu a few years earlier.

"We've been preparing for years, we've been exercising," Dr. Anne Schuchat, the interim deputy director of the science and public health program at Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said last week. "We've been able to invest in preparedness."

Right now, the swine flu does not look like the pandemic initially feared. And the rapid response, including the use of technology to help plot the flu's trajectory, is an indication that planning works.

"Every year we do a pandemic flu exercise with [the Federal Emergency Management Agency], we do training on that," said Rebecca Froboese, executive director of the Federal Executive Board in San Antonio. "So we're pretty used to dealing with these kinds of things and working in collaboration with the city and county governments." 

For more on this story:
- see this Federal Times article