Terrorists Probing Hospitals?

Internal email | July 28, 2004 | FBI bulletin

[jaime1959]

I received the following information via an email bulletin from our Corporate Security Office.

Report of Suspicious Activity Occurring at Hospitals ___________________________________________________________

The FBI has provided information and their concerns that terrorists or criminals may be collecting intelligence on hospital security measures, response capabilities, medical supplies, ICU/ED bed capacities and specific staffing. Their concerns result from suspicious telephone and personal inquiries, the majority of which have occurred in Illinois.

In June 2004, five hospitals received calls from an unidentified female inquiring about their security. In Chicago, a male (who would not provide ID) professed interest in volunteer opportunities, but then asked about the number of beds in the ED and ICU and the number of staff working each shift. In yet another incident, a male claiming to be a physician called a hospital asking if there is a 24-hour pharmacy available and inquired about pharmaceutical and antibiotic supplies (purportedly for a patient with the flu who never came in).

I am requesting your assistance in alerting our staff not to provide any specific information about our security program, security procedures or general hospital capabilities to unknown individuals.

Additionally, anyone receiving a suspicious call/inquiry should: • Take careful note of what is asked. • Request with whom the caller is affiliated. • Note the caller's phone number if possible. • Note any specific information about the call (background noise, voice characteristics, gender, etc.).

[GovernmentShrinker]

A med student friend of mine participated in a multi-hospital emergency preparedness drill in Philadelphia last fall. Her tale sounded like a Laurel & Hardy flick: an emergency room supervisor couldn't figure out there was a drill going on, in spite of people milling around in front of her sporting orange vests with "DRILL OBSERVER" in 8 inch high letters, and after being filled in, re-emerged wearing the hospital's ONLY chemical-protective suit -- which drill staff quickly pointed out to her was minutes from running out of oxygen.

My friend and her fellow "poisoning victims" writhed around on the ground outside the emergency room entrance for half an hour, before one of them got the bright idea of crawling/writhing through the automatically-opening door, to see if someone inside might notice and offer help. He got put on a stretcher and utterly ignored until the drill was declared over.

If I get poisoned/injured in a terrorist attack, I'm not letting anyone take me to a hospital!