Ashland — There is still plenty of time to take measures in battling the H1N1 pandemic, according to health officials.

Local residents who are interested in learning how to respond to the current flu outbreak and future pandemics have the opportunity to participate in a CitizenReady Pandemic Influenza training program this week.

The CitizenReady training program is free and open to the public. Preregistration is not required.

The Ashland-Boyd County-Catlettsburg Medical Reserve Corps will host the training at 6 p.m. on Thursday at the Ashland-Boyd County Health Department on Holt Street in Ashland.

CitizenReady is part of a Phase 2 pilot program sponsored by the American Medical Association in cooperation with the Department of Homeland Security and National Disaster Life Support Foundation.

The program is approximately 1.5 hours in length, according to health department spokeswoman Kristy Bolen, who also serves as the FIVCO Regional epidemiologist and the MRC coordinator.

Participants who complete the course should be able to: Explain the difference between seasonal and pandemic influenza; explain the role of the public health system during a pandemic; describe public health directives that may be issued in a pandemic and why they should be followed; and discuss actions that individuals and communities can take to prepare for and respond to an influenza pandemic.

Bolen said the agency’s goal is to get 50 individuals to participate in order to allow the AMA to have scientific significance when they look at test results from participants.

The goal of the project is to foster community resilience for disasters and public health emergencies through health education, according to officials.

A spokeswoman for the agency did not immediately return calls for comment Friday but according to the AMA’s web site, “CitizenReady will provide competency-based education to help citizens protect themselves, assist others and enhance national efforts to prepare for, respond to and recover from incidents of terrorism and other catastrophic events; Incorporate ways to make the training widely available and encourage public participation in local preparedness and response efforts.”

Bolen said she expects participation to be high based on public interest in the ongoing H1N1 pandemic.

“Even though we’re in the middle of the situation there is still time to prepare,” she said. “We still anticipate seasonal flu spiking in the winter and H1N1 continuing throughout the winter. I think a misconception people have is that we’ve seen a spike of illness. That in no way is going to be it. I anticipate another spike,” she said.

Health officials also hope to recruit some citizens to join the MRC, which will be a volunteer organization assisting health officials to do wide-spread vaccinations for H1N1 later this year and in future pandemics. MRC volunteers can also help administer care during natural disasters or terrorist attacks or other crises.

The Medical Reserve Corps was created following the Sept. 11 attacks as a way to preregister and precredential volunteers, Bolen said.

“After 9/11 we realized there were a lot of people who wanted to help and we wanted to find a way we could pre-credential these people,” she said. “It really helps us know who we have in a community to help and what their credentials are. It also helps us protect those volunteers. As a unit we are able to offer a small amount of insurance for them.”

Bolen said the MRC can use volunteers with both medical and non-medical training. Nurses, doctors and pharmacists are needed but so are “people who can organize, people who can be heavy lifters, people who know how to direct traffic and are willing to hand out registration forms,” she said.

“I think we could use anyone we can get,” Bolen said.

CARRIE STAMBAUGH can

be reached at cstambaugh@

dailyindependent.com.

or (606) 326-2653.