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Philly hospitals gird for DNC protests, terror, heat

Philadelphia's hospitals say they're ready to handle whatever calamity the Democratic National Convention may throw at them next week.

Philadelphia's hospitals say they're ready to handle whatever calamity the Democratic National Convention may throw at them next week.

Mass casualty drills, last September's papal visit, and the fatal crash of Amtrak 188 have tested the city's health systems and proven their mettle, officials said.

"To put things in perspective, concerts and football games bring more people to the city than what the DNC will bring, said Wes Light, emergency preparedness manager for Temple University Hospital.

"The Fourth of July this year attracted a half million people," Light said. "That's tenfold what the DNC is expecting."

Local hospitals are prepared for challenges ranging from heat exhaustion, to an outbreak of food poisoning (which happened in Cleveland), to a terror attack, said Mark Ross, director of emergency preparedness for the Hospital and Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania.

"We plan for the worst and hope for the best," said Ross, who is coordinating local hospital efforts. "We have contingency plans that I can't even say cover A-to-Z because we cover it through quadruple Z," Ross said.

Hospitals participated in an emergency exercise on June 30, he said, that simulated the aftermath of a terror attack similar to what happened in Paris, Brussels and Nice.

"That gave us an idea where potential breaking points were, and where we needed to improve," he said. "We're ready for the eventuality if something should occur."

In the unlikely event of an attack or a riot, the city's six Level 1 trauma centers can accomodate scores of injured patients.

"At a certain level, a mass casualty event would strain any system," said P.J. Brennan, Penn Medicine's chief medical officer. "But Philadelphia is particularly well equipped to handle it because large, well-equipped hospitals are positioned all around the city."

Jefferson Health was designated as the official health-care provider by the DNC committee for its central location and because it will provide medical services for free at the four-day event. Jefferson will have physicians, medics and nurses on site at the Wells Fargo Center and the Philadelphia Convention Center, said Roger Band, an emergency room physician and professor at Thomas Jefferson University.

City health planners aren't only concerned with the well-being of dignitaries, delegates, and Democratic party staffers. Thousands of demonstrators are expected to gather outside the official events.

With another heat wave looming, heat-related illness poses a threat to protesters and law enforcement. Forecasters are expecting temperatures in the mid- to high-90s through much of the week.

The Office of Emergency Management has arranged for pallets of bottled water to be cached along protest routes, outfitted fire hydrants with sprinkler caps, and assigned medics to march with demonstrators along Broad Street, said spokeswoman Noelle Foizen.

Two misting and two first aid tents will be set up in the demonstration zones in South Philadelphia's FDR Park across from the Wells Fargo Center, said a city spokesman.

Police have said they will not use teargas or other clouds of chemical irritants for crowd control.

City EMS medics and firefighters, barred from taking vacations for the week, will be at full force, said Commissioner Adam Thiel.

"The nation's coming and the world's going to be looking," Thiel said. "It's all hands on deck. This is a big deal."

Hospitals, however, have placed no vacation restrictions on their medical staffers.

At Jefferson, Penn, and Temple, elective surgery will go on as planned and doctors will continue to see patients as usual. During the pope's visit, elective procedures were postponed here; during the RNC, Cleveland hospitals did the same.

"We have teams that can come together at a moment's notice to respond to any issue that presents itself," said Richard Webster, president of Thomas Jefferson University Hospitals.

"The Amtrak derailment was validating in demonstrating our existing day-to-day preparedness," he said.

samwood@phillynews.com

215-854-2796 @samwoodiii