Emergency Preparedness

Disasters don't plan ahead, but you can. Learn how to plan ahead from the Minnesota Department of Health.

Weather-related information:

• Excessive heat
• Extreme cold

Trainings offered at no cost to community members:

• Psychological First Aid
• Personal and Family Preparedness in All Seasons 

CPR videos from the American Heart Association

• Hands-Only CPR
• How to perform Child CPR with an AED
• What to Do When an Infant is Choking (Responsive)
• What to Do When an Infant is Choking (Unresponsive)

Public Health builds relationships with community partners, including police, fire, emergency management, faith and community-based organizations and others in order to increase capacity to respond to public health emergencies within the community. 

Initiating a Culturally Competent Ebola Response and Recovery

Emergency preparedness toolkits:

• Faith-based organizations
• Community-based organizations

In the event of a public health emergency such as bioterrorism, pandemic or disease outbreak, medication and other supplies may need to be dispensed to some or all of the population within a specific period of time. 

Public Health has plans in place to quickly and efficiently dispense the needed supplies to the population through points of dispensing (PODs). 

• Open PODs
• Closed PODs

Medical Reserve Corps (MRC) volunteers include medical professionals and non-medical community members without healthcare backgrounds. 

To apply, fill out a City of Bloomington volunteer application, background check authorization form and create an online profile at Minnesota Responds. Once complete, email documents to mrc@BloomingtonMN.gov. 

Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) volunteers are members of the community trained in basic response skills by emergency personnel. Volunteers are prepared to save lives, prevent the spread of disease and protect themselves, their families and their community in the event of a disaster. 

CERT training is a collaboration between Bloomington and Richfield. For more information, visit the City of Richfield. 

• Executive Summary: COVID-19 Response After-Action Report
  • The cities of Bloomington, Edina and Richfield responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by activating a full incident response team led by the City of Bloomington Public Health Division. This document serves as an analysis of the public health-led response effort to the COVID-19 pandemic from those who were embedded at the core of planning, implementing, and evaluating response operations.
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
• Medical Reserve Corps (MRC)
• Metro Health and Medical Coalition
• Minnesota Department of Health (MDH)
• Pandemic Influenza information
• Updates on novel (new) and variant influenza A viruses
• Ready.gov