Rhode Island
- State Population: 1,093,734
- Local Health Departments: N/A
- Frequent Public Health Emergencies: Winter Storms, Flooding, Tropical Storms/Hurricanes
- Key Emergency Operations Center Activations: 2020: COVID-19 Pandemic; 2018: Hospital Strike
- CDC PHEP Funding:
FY 2022: $5,369,497
FY 2021: $5,336,988
FY 2020: $5,271,773 - Public Health Crisis Response Funding
Mpox 2023 funding: $246,705
COVID-19 2021 funding: $7,195,794
COVID-19 2020 funding: $6,069,229
- Epidemiologists: 1
- Laboratorians: 7
- Nurses: 2
- Planners: 7
- Other: 8*
*Includes IT specialists, administrative staff, statisticians, and other positions
1 Career Epidemiology Field Officer
- Public Health Laboratory Testing
- Public Health Surveillance and Epidemiologic Investigation
- Medical Countermeasure Dispensing and Distribution
- Community Preparedness
- Medical Material Management and Distribution
In Rhode Island, the PHEP program developed a special needs emergency registry and continuously trains municipal partners in how to use it. This ensures that in the event of an emergency, partners can access and download the registry’s data for their municipality. In January and March of 2018—when Rhode Island experienced severe winter storms—eighty-percent of municipal partners accessed the PHEP-supported special needs emergency registry to coordinate support for vulnerable residents living in areas experiencing power outages.
When an outbreak of meningitis B in 2015 left two Providence College students hospitalized and 3,800 students at risk, the Rhode Island Department of Health partnered with Providence College to organize a mass vaccination clinic on campus. The Department of Health relied on its PHEP-funded contract with the Rhode Island Medical Reserve Corps (RI MRC) to provide vaccinators. As a result, 3,061 students were vaccinated in one day, helping to prevent further cases.
