Hospitals in the Carolinas will receive special stockpiles of nerve-agent antidotes late this year or in early 2005 as part of a program to protect communities against terrorist attacks.
The so-called "chem-packs" contain medication that would help doctors treat victims exposed to chemical weapons such as sarin or VX nerve gas, which can cause nausea, seizures, paralysis and even death.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began quietly distributing the long-awaited stockpiles several months ago, with New York City and Boston -- sites of the Democratic and Republican conventions -- getting some of the earliest shipments.
The plan is to have stockpiles across the country within two years. For security reasons, CDC officials won't say which states have been supplied so far.
But North Carolina is scheduled to receive its shipment in the last quarter of 2004, the state's top bioterrorism expert told the Observer. South Carolina will receive its drugs early next year.
After Sept. 11, 2001, and the anthrax attacks that followed, federal and state officials decided that more antidotes were needed nationwide to protect against chemical and biological agents.
Vaccines to fight anthrax, smallpox and other diseases are stored in secret stockpiles around the country.
Officials say any U.S. city should be able to receive a vaccine shipment within 12 hours.
But that wouldn't be fast enough to respond to a chemical attack, said Dr. James Kirkpatrick, North Carolina's bioterrorism coordinator. "With a nerve agent, you really only have a short amount of time -- minutes to hours," he said.
Sarin and other nerve agents, originally developed as pesticides, might have been used in chemical warfare during the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, the CDC says. A radical cult killed 12 people and injured nearly 6,000 in 1995 by releasing sarin nerve gas in the Tokyo subway system.
Some hospitals and paramedics carry a limited supply of nerve-gas antidotes already, but each chem-pack -- which includes a variety of antidotes and medical supplies -- would be enough to treat 1,000 people in a full-scale attack, Kirkpatrick said.
North Carolina will receive about 50 packs, costing the federal government $3.1 million. Officials are determining how to distribute them to hospitals and ambulance services.
"We obviously don't want them all in one place," Kirkpatrick said. The goal is to be sure there's a chem-pack stored within an hour of every N.C. community. Major cities, including Charlotte, will likely get more.
South Carolina, with its smaller population, will receive about half as many packs as its neighbor, at a cost of $1.5 million.
Locations that receive the packs must provide security. The stockpiles also are equipped with their own sensors, which will be hooked up to a phone line. If they're tampered with or not maintained at the correct temperature, the packs can call the CDC to sound an alarm.
Kirkpatrick said some of the packs will be kept in a mobile facility that could be taken to major events, such as NASCAR races or football games, in case of attack.
The government program stalled after an initial launch last year, officials said, but restarted this spring. The CDC spent $56 million to create packs and budgeted $34 million this year for distribution. -- THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CONTRIBUTED TO THIS REPORT.
-- SCOTT DODD: (704) 358-5168; SDODD@CHARLOTTEOBSERVER.COM.
Nerve Agents
Examples: Sarin, one of the earliest nerve agents, was developed in 1938 in Germany and used by terrorists in Japan in 1995. VX, the deadliest, was produced in 1952 in England. Breathing a dose of 10 mg, not much more than a grain of rice, can be fatal.
Appearance: Clear and colorless, with no odor or a faint, sweetish smell. Nerve agents can enter the body through inhalation or contact with the skin.
Symptoms: Twitching, reduced vision, headache, nausea, drooling, diarrhea, slurred speech, convulsions, vomiting, respiratory failure, paralysis, coma, death.
Treatment: Complete washing of the eyes and skin with water. Two drugs, atropine and pralidoxime chloride, that can block nerve agents in the body were issued to U.S. troops during the 1991 Persian Gulf War and the current conflict in Iraq.