PUBLIC HEALTH AND DISASTER.
Peter Odada Sumba Monday, April 21, 2003.
Summary
Disasters are sudden happenings whose records have grown
with human civilization. Natural disasters were considered low key probability
happenings of nature associated with bad omen in some society. As always
disasters are associated with wide spread destruction of nature and
infrastructures resulting in severe distress in the affected communities
Disasters can be grouped into three major categories
(1) Natural disasters, (2) Accidental disasters, (3) Man made disasters.
Natural disasters:
- Earthquake / Volcanic eruptions;
- Floods;
- Thunder and lighting;
- Droughts;
- Hurricanes and Tornados;
- Disease outbreaks, (Cholera, Plagues, HIV/AIDS and SARS).
The new technologies today can enable us to predict the occurrence of the natural disasters in the world and prepare mitigations. Based on a number of factors the following are the top twelve countries with high probability of natural disasters in the world.
Afghanistan; has frequent earthquakes, floods and droughts in 1988 floods 6,000 people died.
Algeria: earthquakes and floods, 1980 earth quakes killed 3,600 people and 750 died in the November 2001 floods;
Bangladesh: floods, in 1987 and 1988 affected 70 million people, in 1991, Cyclone killed 138,000 people, 1970, wind and storm killed 300,000 – 500,000 people. The other countries are
Brazil, China, India,
Indonesia, Iran, Italy, Philippines, Turkey and Vietnam. The details of disasters
are found at http://www.btinternet.com/~mike.ferris/statistic3.htm
The magnitude and lose that accompany
disasters can not be over estimated when one looks back at the history. Between
A.D.856 to March / 25/ 2002 there were 52 major earthquakes and volcanic
eruptions and several floods and droughts experienced in different parts of the
world. The damage and loss is unbearable when one adds the effects of Hurricanes
and Tornados
Accidental disasters:
- Wild forest fire, or any form of unexpected fire like what happened in Australia in early 2003;
- General accidents involving airplanes, ferries,
- Motor vehicles or trains;
- Oil leakage on land or sea;
- Nuclear reactors or chemical malfunctions like the Chernobyl. Some of these accidents have adverse environment and health impact on human beings.
Man made disasters:
Man made disasters are turning out to be frequent and with heavy toll on human life, destruction on infrastructures and environment and depleting the food resources. This has created fear in the human race than ever before. The consequences of wars cannot be easily determined on the population’s economic and health needs. The major impact comes much later and hardly does the affected population recover the lost treasures.
- Wars and civil uprising;
- Terrorists;
- Bio-terrorists ;
Wars cripple all health systems by destruction of resources and infrastructures. Countries like Mozambique, Bosnia, Angola, Afarganistan and Iraq are among many countries of the world which have borne the casualties from disease epidemics and land mines among other crimes. It has neurological effects on children development and destroys social settings. In Rwanda about 500,000 lives were lost and many children left homeless. The psychosocial stress among the people results in many disease complications requiring major public health intervention. The result of current war engagement in the Middle East is hard to predict. The animosities may result in terrorists attack in future and it can occur anywhere in the world.
http://www.members.iinet.au/~gduncan/maritime.html
Nobody wants to remember what happened during
September 11, terrorist attack in the USA and the bloody lose of life. This
followed the attacks on the US embassy in Tanzania and Kenya by the same group out
to score political goals.
The terrorists are now focusing on the use of biological or chemical materials as tools of mass destruction. The preferred biological materials which can be used to cause wide spread and localized destructions are:
- smallpox virus;
- anthrax spores;
- paramyxoviruses (pneumovirinae);
- ebola virus;
-
yellow fever, and other hemorrhagic viruses.
People are never too young or too old to think about disaster preparation. Because of its impacts on health and social settings, public health practitioners should aim for global health risk awareness making it a family affair and promote dialogue and not confrontation.
Public health
education:
The society should be aware of critical earth science information on natural hazards including ocean logy, earthquakes, floods, volcanoes, wild land fires, landslides, and other geologic and hydrologic hazards. The availability of vital information may reduce the worlds’ vulnerability to disasters and provide steps for planning preventive measures.
To achieve global humanization of public health, there is need to steer clear of politics and maximize local resources for better health.
· During disasters, everybody is involved and adequate information by the media, internet, radios, newspapers and other prints is quite
important;
· The community should organize their resources to face the challenges like fast aid and transportation to health facilities;
· It is important to chart out model of action with each group leader effectively communicating to other leaders for easy distribution of resources and procurement and supply of relief materials..
·
Creating contact network with relevant agencies about
the events can greatly improve the community’s
health strategies and structures.
· The cost evaluation and projection during disasters may not be done immediately but estimates can be relayed to other international organizations. When one looks at the cost of Hurricane Floyd and Hurricane Georges across 18 states in USA in 1998 and 1999 it was $ 11.9 billion dollars and 113 deaths. This is beyond the reach of a number of developing countries but with good coordination the reconstruction can be managed.. http://www.floodfacts.com/storm_green_disaster.html
Introduction
Disasters are sudden serious happenings with impacts which may
be beyond coping by a country or community. After major disasters, there is
panic and shock but survivors immediately get organized into rescue teams. Causalities
occur mainly at the affected or the near by locations and require immediate
medical attention. Assessment of the magnitude of injuries is done and
treatment is organized based on the local capability. Epidemiology of health related
issues to disasters emerge later and require specialized skilled team to
evaluate. The effects normally vary within a given area. Disasters may result
in a complete breakdown of infrastructure like in Mexico and Venezuela where
thirteen hospitals, homes, bridges, railway lines and roads were either washed
away by floods or destroyed by volcanic eruptions bringing to a halt the
communication system. In such situations Relief Supplies and Drugs may not
reach the affected communities in time resulting in unprecedented high number
of casualties.
Essential Public Health Service
- Improve the sanitations to prevent epidemics and the spread of diseases;
- Disposal and handling of environmental hazards like chemical wastes, food remains and other household waste materials;
- Response to disasters should be people driven and community centered for coping and recovery;
- Involvement of local health providers will assure the continuity of the quality and accessibility of health services;
- Surveillance to monitor and identify community health problems;
- Diagnosis and data maintenance of health problems and environmental hazards in the community;
- Inform, educate, and empower people about health issues by encouraging early treatment seeking and promotion of preventive medicine ;
- Mobilize community partnerships to identify and solve health problems through discussions and media information;
- Develop policies and plans that support individual and community health efforts by reviewing records of the health activities in the communities and note the successes and the shortcomings;
- Enforce laws and regulations that protect health and ensure safety for every member, the application should be without favors;
- Encourage competent public health and personal health care workforce motivated community health education.
- Evaluate effectiveness, accessibility, and quality of personal and population based health services
Objective
- To ensure appropriate systems, procedures, and resources are in place to provide prompt, effective assistance to disaster victims;
- Facilitate formation of health networks for relief measures and rehabilitation services as an integral part of the national health management system;
- Sensitize the community to develop plans and programs for disaster prevention, mitigation, preparedness, response, rehabilitation and reconstruction.
- To achieve these plans, clear mechanisms for coordinating with the local groups and international organizations must be put in place.
The sole purpose is to reduce vulnerability, implement the programs at reasonable cost and ensure continuity of services.
The main key to success in any disaster situation is
accurate information by the local media agencies to the international world. Realization
of change take time, even though people may not readily change we must keep on
passing the vital information to them and provide appropriate education in
emergency management and proper utilization of scarce resources available during
this period of time.
Management and preparations for disasters are well documented
by a number of organizations in the developed world but the link is missing in the
developing countries.. In Africa, the lack
of coherent disaster-related figures means the impact of the disaster is highly
underestimated. In some cases it is so because of lack of cooperation from the
political establishment fearing blacklisting by international world due lack of
sound economic management. These countries bare the burden of disasters
due to minimal technological development
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In the last decade alone, 4,777 natural
disasters have taken more than 880,000 lives, affected the homes, health and
livelihoods of almost 2 billion people around the world and inflicted
approximately $687 billion in global economic losses. But thanks to the
disaster mitigation programs, the loss of lives and homes has been less than
it could have been. Even though the number of disasters has
more than tripled since the 1970s, the reported death toll has decreased to
less than half. The exception may be regions like
southern Africa, where some 13 million people today are suffering from a food
shortage. Famine threatens at least six southern African countries ,
Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia, Mozambique, Lesotho, and Swaziland; where lives are
already being lost to hunger. Mozambique has suffered several disasters in
the last decade, the civil uprising brought in mines every where in the
country. The farms were mined resulting in reduced food production and
subsequent hunger. This caused massive loses to civilian lives and animals. After
the war there as been ravaging floods and frequent droughts Drought is a particularly difficult
disaster to mitigate. Absence of a precise and universally accepted
definition of drought adds to the confusion as to whether it exists, and if
it does the degree of its severity, is often forgotten once it ends, and
everybody seems to be caught unawares. For a mitigation program to be
successful, local leaders and residents must wholeheartedly adopt mitigation
practices into their daily lives. Inhabitants of local communities are
potential victims of natural disaster. They also represent the greatest
potential source of local knowledge regarding hazardous conditions, and are
the repositories of any traditional coping mechanisms suited to their individual
environment. The local communities are those most aware of historical risk
scenarios and the ones closest to their own reality. Nature is hard to predict like single
most terrible year in human loss in the last decade was 1991, when a cyclone
devastated Bangladesh, killing 139,000 people. Cyclones are cyclical and they
continue to hit the Bangladesh coasts but no such catastrophe has happened
again. It is important though that the coastal residence take steps to
mitigate any eventual happenings.
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