INTRODUCTION Medical countermeasures are vital to protect the public against acts of terrorism and other public health emergencies. The need for an effec- tive system of dispensing medical countermeasures gained recognition in 1979 after the accidental release of radionuclides from the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania. If emissions had been higher, widespread dispensing of the countermeasure potassium iodide would have been necessary to prevent future cases of thyroid cancer among those living nearby or downwind. More than two decades later, in the fall of 2001, America witnessed its first bioterrorist attack of Bacillus anthracis (anthrax), spread.
