Mt. Pleasant, SC - Trident Health System is reporting 20 percent of their E.R. patients are showing up with flu like symptoms. The trend is putting the lowcountry government on alert.

The fear is that many city employees like firefighters would come down with the swine flu all at once. That’s why town employees east of the Cooper are crossing lines to help.

Mount Pleasant Fire Department Station 3 has 10 people per shift and when duty calls, its all hands on board.

“You have to have enough people. People to drive the apparatus, people to command the scene, people to fight fire, provide emergency medical services and it takes a team approach,” Mt. Pleasant Fire Department’s Assistant Chief Robert Wagenbrenner said.

But the H1N1 threat is causing alarm.

“Mt Pleasant Fire Department Station three we have ten people assigned to each shift. 8 is minimum staffing, so if we had four call in sick with H1N1 flu, we would not have enough people to staff all three units,” Wagenbrenner said.

That puts firefighters and people in danger and, that’s why Mount Pleasant, the Isle of Palms and Sullivan’s Island are teaming up.

“We would be crossing over and borrowing staff from one another,” Isle of Palms City Administrator Linda Tucker said.

The mutual aid spans across several city services including fire, police and public works. All three mayors made their mark for that pre-emptive step to be prepared for the worst possible H1N1 pandemic.

“I think its a forward thinking step and I hope we never have to do it but we don’t know what the future lies ahead and its better to be prepared for that than not,” Sullivan’s Island Mayor Carl Smith said.

 Email To Friend