Dora Anne Mills interviewed by Bangor Daily News on post-9/11 federal funding for emergency preparedness

Dora Anne Mills, M.D., M.P.H., UNE vice president for clinical affairs, was interviewed by the Bangor Daily News for a Sept. 9, 2011 story on how post-9/11 funding helped Maine strengthen public health and emergency preparedness. Mills served as director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention from 1996-2010.

The Maine CDC has received about $82.5 million in federal funds since 2004 for general preparedness and another $9 million just for the H1N1 influenza epidemic.

“That money has made all the difference in the world,” Mills said. "The main objective was to prepare for public health emergencies by way of strengthening the public health infrastructure.” Before the Sept. 11 attacks, she said, “Maine simply did not have a public health infrastructure.”