Nerve agents personal protective equipment

Occupational Safety and Health Administration, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. Interim Guidance on Personal Protective Equipment Selection for Emergency Responders Nerve Agents, August 30, 2004 (http //www.osha.gov/SLTC/... 

Personal Protective Equipment Standard turnout gear with SCBA provides a first responder with sufficient protection from nerve agent vapor hazards inside interior or downwind areas of the hot zone to allow thirty minutes rescue time for known live victims. Self-taped turnout gear with SCBA provides sufficient protection in an unknown nerve agent environment for a three-minute reconnaissance to search for living victims, (or a two-minute reconnaissance if mustard, blister agent (HD) is suspected). 

Personal Protective Equipment Standard turnout gear with SCBA provides a first responder with sufficient protection from nerve agent vapor hazards inside interior or downwind areas of the hot zone to allow thirty minutes rescue time for known live victims. 

There are important differences between on-target military attacks against relatively well-protected armed forces and nerve agent attacks initiated by terrorists against a civilian population. In contrast to military personnel, civilians are unlikely to be pre-treated with pyridostigmine and protected by personal protective equipment (PPE). Furthermore, the time after exposure when specific therapy can first be administered to civilians is likely to be delayed. Even conservative estimates suggest a delay between exposure and the first administration of atropine/oxime of at least 30 min. The clinical importance of this delay is discussed below. 

This book is part of a 15-hour basic training course. This course consists of a series of lectures about the various terrorist weapons and methods of attack and the proper way to respond to them. Along with the lectures will be demonstrations of various types of equipment needed to identify the weapon being used. The course also consists of four hands-on skill stations to teach how to use personal protective equipment (PPE), how to decontaminate patients, how to use the Nerve Agent Antidote Kit, and scenario exercises in how to respond to the various types of terrorist attacks. These same principles apply to responding to hazardous materials incidents and clandestine drug laboratories. 

The Iran-Iraq war provided the first wartime casualties from the use of nerve agents who were documented and treated by well-trained physicians using modern equipment. The use of modem antidotes and life support measures kept the mortality low. Personal protective equipment was available but there was a failure of protection with filtration respirators due to the fact that many of the soldiers had beards. The low dead-to-wounded ratio (<2 %) reflected the immediate and continuing respiratory and antidote care provided. 

Fig. 2-37. The M5 Combat Service Mask, the first U.S. mask with the canister placed directly on the cheek. The M5 mask was part of the personal equipment of the troops who landed at Normandy on 6 June 1944. Postwar tests indicated that it might have protected against respiratory exposure to the nerve agent tabun if the Germans had chosen to use it against the invasion armada. Photograph Chemical and Biological Defense Command Historical Research and Response Team, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md.

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