I did some reading on this many years ago. I am not in the
health industry. Here is another POV.

Assess the nature of the disease, 1)how it moves and 2)incubation
period.

A long incubation period may be bad, because the disease can
travel and be on all sides of you. Its also hard to keep away
from all people. Any person might be contagious.

How it spreads: directly like TB, Flu etc. or through some
animals like fleas, rats, flies, mosquitoes.

Imagine that a bunch of city people have relocated to rural
areas, camping out, and are tolerated by local people.
Cholera can be carried by flies from excrement leavings.
Yellow Fever can be carried by mosquitos. These are just 2
examples of diseases carred by flies and mosquitos. How are
you fixed for bug netting materials, chemicals etc?

I have read that hospitals would not take highly contagious
patients with bird-flu, during a pandemic. Patients would be
routed to local "treatment" centers.

Read some old and new govenment publications. Maybe, some are
on the web.

Edit:
To more directly answer your question, I had a handheld
scanner (10 years ago) and found it very informative.
There is a constant battle to uprade gov and emergency
radio (and stop you from listening). Ask around.

Ask your "info question" of some reporters: radio, tv,
print, freelance etc. These guys have ways and means,
and workable scanners.

Ask admitting nurses at hospitals and clinics, how you
might get a heads-up on a upsurge of similar cases.