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UMD Celebrates 15 Years Of Center For Health and Homeland Security

BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- How does a community prepare for a terrorist attack, or a catastrophic natural disaster? It takes expertise, planning, and practice.

Denise Koch has more on one of the world's leading organizations for preparedness located in Baltimore.

A party is going on at the University of Maryland's 'Center for Health and Homeland Security as it celebrates an anniversary.

Fifteen years ago it was created to respond to a dangerous world. A reality brought home on 9/11 took the country by surprise.

The Center for Health and Homeland Security, CHHS, works to take the surprise out of the equation by training communities ahead of time.

Whether it's terrorism, epidemic or nature's fury.

"Fortunately, we have not had that many serious counter-terrorism events but we have had superstorms. Superstorm Sandy. Even in Baltimore, we had Snowmageddon where the city fell apart," says Michael Greenberger, director of the Center. "The organization of the response to a terror attack is similar to the organization to something like superstorm Sandy, is similar to Ebola, Zika and now we're working on the opioid epidemic."

CHHS worked with Sierra Leone during the 2014 Ebola crisis and helped contain what could have been a worldwide pandemic. They also helped after devastating flooding in Ellicott City.

A staff of 35 handles nearly 100 contracts worldwide.

"Somebody comes to us and says, we want you to be able to respond to say, Zika. Can you give us a plan? Can you train us on the plan? Can we do exercises?" Greenberger says.

9/11 opened the door to the fact we were going to be under constant worry about catastrophic events that required all levels of government to organize themselves to respond.

The Center for Health and Homeland Security also responded after the Freddie Gray riots. Right now it's concentrating on what it sees as a significant threat in the future: cyber security.

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