ASPR kicks off Tranquil Passport Exercise to test new portable biocontainment unit and healthcare system’s ability to isolate and treat high-consequence infectious disease patients
Today, the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR), a part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and more than 50 partner organizations began the first of several complex patient movement activities as part of the Tranquil Passport exercise. This four-day, coordinated full-scale exercise will test and validate the nation's ability to safely and securely transport simulated patients with high-consequence infectious diseases to regional treatment centers, and will demonstrate capabilities of the new Portable Biocontainment Unit (PBCU). Lessons learned will inform future exercises and real-world responses.
"Testing our new biocontainment unit makes America safer and strengthens our national security," said HHS Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response John Knox. "This cutting-edge technology allows us to more quickly and safely transport patients to treatment centers in the U.S. for definitive care, while ensuring containment of the simulated highly infectious disease used in the exercise. Exercises like this are essential to testing our healthcare delivery systems and improving our ability to save lives and protect the health care workforce."
The Tranquil Passport exercise began with government officials facilitating a series of coordination calls to plan the movement of a cluster of simulated American high-consequence infectious disease patients from Toronto, Canada to the United States on June 24. Exercise patients were moved today using the PCBU to Washington, D.C. to be transferred to Medstar Washington Hospital Center, Children's National Medical Center, and Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. The Department of State's Containerized Bio-Containment systems (CBCS), designed to transport high-consequence infectious disease patients via air from abroad to the U.S. for treatment, was also used.
ASPR's PCBU will be used to transport additional simulated patients for the duration of the exercise to treatment centers at Health + Hospitals/Bellevue (New York City, NY); Emory University Hospital and Children's Healthcare of Atlanta (Atlanta, GA); and University of North Carolina Medical Center (Chapel Hill, NC). These facilities are HHS supported Level 1 Regional Emerging Special Pathogen Treatment Centers (RESPTCs), part of the tiered National Special Pathogen System designed to protect patients, communities and the healthcare workforce.
The PBCU is the first domestic resource for isolating and transporting patients with high-consequence infectious diseases, such as Ebola, over long distances to RESPTCs. It is the only multi-patient, multi-modal transport solution of it's kind and it was designed and built in America. The unit can be transported over long distances by air on a C-130 or L-100 aircraft or by ground via a specialized trailer that can be pulled by a tractor or semi-truck. The new PBCU builds on and improves isolation and transport technology. The PBCU allows for continuous treatment of multiple patients isolated in the unit and for onboard care teams to switch out during longer transportation or until the patients can receive more definitive care at a RESPTC hospital. In addition to having the only domestic patient transport authority for high-consequence infectious diseases through HHS, the PBCU's interior is uniquely customizable to accommodate up to 10 ambulatory patients and reach virtually any airport in the U.S., which current technology cannot do.
HHS and the U.S. Departments of State and Defense previously collaborated on a series of exercises to move Americans acting as high-consequence infectious disease patients from overseas to the United States for treatment. A video summary of the most recent patient movement exercise in that series, Tranquil Terminus, is available for review here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LL1BEwy-2DQ.
For more information on Tranquil Passport or the PBCU visit: https://aspr.hhs.gov/Tranquil-Passport/Pages/default.aspx.
Video sound bites of the exercise are available for download at: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/fsi366v7luelqble2v6v2/AKCywMQdqPIH-XZpNzoh6To?rlkey=i5u8zsze17lv0lnlq64pu77ju&e=1&dl=0.
Photos of the exercise will be available at: https://www.flickr.com/photos/asprgov/albums/72177720326305186/.
