Legal difference Between State of Emergency / Disaster Emergency ?

[Roland45]

I started the thread yesterday about Tom Wolf declaring a state of emergency in Pa. over drug over dose deaths, Today I searched the world wide web for the same phrase "Gov. Tom Wolf declares state of emergency in Pa. opioid epidemic" and it appears that all the new links that pop up are reporting that
" Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf declares disaster emergency in Pa. opioid epidemic "
So I ask myself the question, what's the Lawful difference between a State of Emergency and a Disaster Emergency?
Again,
Thanks to all who have the time and knowledge to answer.
Roland

[middlefinger]

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Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf declares disaster emergency over 'opioid and heroin epidemic'

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf has declared a disaster emergency over what he termed the state's opioid and heroin epidemic that is killing thousands through drug overdoses.


Gov. Tom Wolf issued a disaster declaration Wednesday for the “heroin and opioid epidemic” that’s killing Pennsylvanians daily and straining government finances as first responders race to overdose calls across the state.

Disaster declarations — normally reserved for natural calamities — allow governors to waive certain regulatory and legal procedures to speed up recovery efforts without legislative approval. This is believed to be the first time it’s been used in Pennsylvania for a man-made crisis.

Wolf is waiving 13 regulations or protocols in an effort to direct more resources to battling drug addiction and the overdoses that killed 238 in the Lehigh Valley and another 4,362 across the state in 2016. Last year, 169 died in Lehigh County and 91 in Northampton County. Statewide numbers for 2017 are being tallied.

He said the effort is meant to “waive statutory regulations that create barriers to treatment and prevention, prevent first responders and others from saving lives, and reduce efficiency of our response.”

In October, President Donald Trump declared a national “health emergency” in light of 59,000 deaths across the country in 2016. Like Trump’s order, Wolf’s declaration offers no extra money, which he says isn’t necessary to implement his ideas.

Pennsylvania’s drug overdose rate is more than twice the national average.

His disaster plan starts an Opioid Operational Command Center at the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency for better coordination among nine state agencies, including the state police and the departments of Health, Human Services, Drug and Alcohol, Aging, and Labor and Industry.

The plan allows agencies operating from the command center to access the state’s prescription drug monitoring database to track the quantity of opioid pills doctors and others are issuing. Only the Health Department, State Department, attorney general’s office and private physicians had permission to access the database before the declaration.

“These collaborations work,” said Layne Turner, Lehigh County’s Drug & Alcohol assistant administrator. “It does make a difference when agencies are working together, and the further upstream you go, to the state level in this situation, the more you learn and the easier it is for everyone to do their job.”

To better understand the social affects of addiction, Wolf’s plan requires medical providers, such as EMS units and hospitals, to report to the state Health Department cases of nonfatal overdoses and of infants diagnosed as having opioid dependency inherited from their mother. Those conditions were not reportable unless there was a death or the parent was poor.

Bethlehem Health Director Kristen Wenrich hopes streamlining and sharing data will provide the state a clearer picture of how widespread the opioid problem is. She said coordinating data on overdose deaths and nonfatal overdoses “has been a challenge” because there’s no central database. It requires data from hospitals, paramedics, coroner offices and other police agencies to understand the problem.

“You really need to sift through all that data to even begin to get a grasp of the epidemic,” Wenrich said. “And that data is only as good as the agencies and individuals reporting it.”

Special Report: Heroin's heavy toll on the Lehigh Valley
Beth Miller, assistant administrator in the Northampton County Drug and Alcohol Division, would like hospitals to be able to more easily share information with state and county agencies about nonfatal overdoses. Now patients are given treatment codes when they enter a hospital that can make it difficult later to offer addiction treatment.

For families, Wolf is allowing first responders to leave behind samples of the anti-overdose drug naloxone after responding to a call at a residence. Wolf also is permitting pharmacists to stock more naloxone than permitted under law.

He waives a face-to-face requirement needed before a physician can approve addiction treatment, and forgoes licensing requirements that hospitals needed to open new treatment programs. He also waives a state fee for a duplicate birth certificate for homeless or indigent addicts who need it to get into treatment.

The disaster declaration comes on top of a raft of bills aimed at the opioid problem that the Republican-led Legislature wrote and Wolf, a Democrat, signed into law. On Wednesday, Wolf praised that bipartisan effort, saying the “scourge does not discriminate.”

Wolf’s declaration lasts 90 days but can be extended.

“We know that we are not going to cure the heroin and opioid epidemic in 90 days,” said Sarah Galbally, his secretary of policy and planning.

Betsy Martellucci, clinical director of Mid-Atlantic Rehabilitation Services in Bethlehem, applauded the declaration, especially the provisions that will cut red tape for treatment providers and patients. The new rules streamline the paperwork clinics have to provide to the state, and make it easier for people seeking treatment to get a birth certificate if they’ve lost theirs.

“There is a large homeless population and transient population that’s in need of our services,” Martellucci said. “To require them to come up with different forms of identification and proof of residency before they can be seen, that’s a tall order.”

Wolf also seeks to limit the availability of fentanyl, a synthetic opioid clinically used to treat pain but clandestinely made in labs and sold on the black market, contributing mightily to overdoses and deaths. He reclassified the state’s less restrictive definition of fentanyl to match a tougher federal one.

Some Pennsylvania counties and municipalities are suing pharmaceutical companies over slick marketing campaigns that downplayed the risk of opioid pain killers to treat several moderate and light pain. Wolf’s not joining the effort.

“That is the attorney general’s job,” Wolf said of litigation.

Attorney General Josh Shapiro has joined 41 other states’ attorneys general in investigating the industry, and that probe is continuing, agency spokesman Joe Grace said.

In 2016, the five states with the highest rate of deaths due to drug overdose were West Virginia (52 per 100,000 people), Ohio (39.1), New Hampshire (39), Pennsylvania (37.9) and Kentucky (33.5).

steve.esac

http://www.mcall.com/news/nationworl...110-story.html

[GunLawyer001]

(c) Declaration of disaster emergency.--A disaster emergency shall be declared by executive order or proclamation of the Governor upon finding that a disaster has occurred or that the occurrence or the threat of a disaster is imminent. The state of disaster emergency shall continue until the Governor finds that the threat or danger has passed or the disaster has been dealt with to the extent that emergency conditions no longer exist and terminates the state of disaster emergency by executive order or proclamation, but no state of disaster emergency may continue for longer than 90 days unless renewed by the Governor. The General Assembly by concurrent resolution may terminate a state of disaster emergency at any time. Thereupon, the Governor shall issue an executive order or proclamation ending the state of disaster emergency. All executive orders or proclamations issued under this subsection shall indicate the nature of the disaster, the area or areas threatened and the conditions which have brought the disaster about or which make possible termination of the state of disaster emergency. An executive order or proclamation shall be disseminated promptly by means calculated to bring its contents to the attention of the general public and, unless the circumstances attendant upon the disaster prevent or impede, shall be promptly filed with the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency and the Legislative Reference Bureau for publication under Part II of Title 45 (relating to publication and effectiveness of Commonwealth documents).

Basically, it's a way for any governor to give himself absolute power, unless the Legislature vetoes it with a resolution.

[Roland45]

1

[Roland45]

Thank you for your time and patience GunLawyer001 .