Don't worry if you see emergency vehicles parked outside Humphrey Coliseum Wednesday, August 16. The facility is the site of an exercise testing the state's Strategic National Stockpile dispensing plan. This plan is how the state will dispense medicine and medical supplies in time of emergency (terrorist attack or natural disaster). MSU Police and Facilities Use personnel and state, county and city agencies will be participating in the exercise. There also will be local volunteers such as the Red Cross, fire fighters and the Oktibbeha County Hospital.
MSU's Center for Governmental Technology has coordinated this exercise for the state Health Department as a part of the state agency's program for the pandemic flu plan. The exercise will begin at 7:30 a.m. and conclude around noon. Some 200 workers and 150 volunteers should be at the coliseum during the exercise. The volunteers will be "patients" that will be processed through the coliseum dispensing operation and "receive" the flu vaccine.