You Can Help Bay Area Health Departments Today

The Bay Area Mass Prophylaxis Working Group is today asking Bay Area residents to test an emergency website that would help the public receive life-saving medications in the event of an infectious disease emergency such as an anthrax attack.

The website would allow the public to answer screening questions to speed up the process of dispensing the appropriate medicine.

The site also includes information regarding where emergency medicine dispensaries are located, how people can be trained to work at these dispensaries, and how businesses can participate, health officials said.

This screening exercise is a Bay Area-wide effort and health departments from around the region helped to create the screening questions that experts believe should be asked to prevent serious side effects from taking the wrong antibiotics.

Participants will be asked to print out a questionnaire and take a short survey. They are also asked to fill out a questionnaire for the people they would potentially pick up medicine for, health officials said. The process should take around 10 minutes.

Participants are asked to fill out the screening questionnaire at any of three times today: 10 a.m., 2 p.m., or 4 p.m., although the public can participate at any time today.

After you go to their website, click on the "Get Medicine" tab.

-Bay City News