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Finkelstein, A., & Finkelstein, I. (2018). Emergency preparedness–The perceptions and experiences of people with disabilities. Disability and rehabilitation, 1-11.

Abstract:

Background: A population well-prepared for mass emergencies will respond better in real-time crisis and will be less exposed to the negative effects caused by the event. Our aim was to learn about the ways in which people with disabilities perceive emergencies and to understand their needs in preparing for these situations.

Methods: Sixteen semistructured in-depth interviews were held with 17 people with disabilities (motor, sensory or mental) (One interview was with a pair who chose to be interviewed together). The analysis was conducted using the phenomenological approach.

Results: Participants had not made any particular preparation for managing emergencies. Their approach was fatalistic, given their strong dependence on people and machines. They expressed their general distrust of the authorities’ ability to address their needs in an emergency. Even individuals with the same disability presented a variety of needs.

Conclusions: To properly address the vulnerability of people with disabilities in emergencies, professionals need a better understanding of their individual way of life in routine times and to find ways to empower them to become involved in their own emergency preparedness. The needs of people with disabilities should be considered in terms of space and time, as well as by categories of disability.

PDF : http://www.kshalem.org.il/uploads/Finkelstein%20and%20Finkelstein%20(2019)_%20Emergency%20preparednessThe%20perception___.pdf.pdf

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 קמחי שאול, מרציאנו הדס ואשל יוחנן - המרכז לדחק וחוסן, החוג לפסיכולוגיה, המכללה האקדמית תל-חי; עדיני ברוריה - החוג לניהול מצבי חירום ואסון, בית הספר לבריאות הציבור הפקולטה לרפואה ע"ש סאקלר, אוניברסיטת תל-אביב 

תקציר:

בעקבות סבב "חגורה שחורה" שנערך ברצועת עזה, התקיים מחקר בקרב מדגם אקראי של 508 תושבי עוטף עזה במגמה לאמוד את החוסן הקהילתי והלאומי של תושבי האזור שהיו חשופים לנפילת טילים. הממצאים הושוו למחקרים קודמים שבוצעו בקרב מדגם ארצי (בשנת 2018) ומדגם אוכלוסיה במועצה אזורית גליל עליון (בשנת 2019). עיקרי הממצאים הראו כי: א. ממוצע החוסן הקהילתי במדגם תושבי עוטף עזה גבוה באופן מובהק בהשוואה לממוצע החוסן הקהילתי במדגם הארצי. ב. ככול שהנחקרים מדווחים על עמדות פוליטיות יותר שמאליות, גיל צעיר יותר, השתייכות לקהילה קטנה יותר, תחושה רבה יותר של מוגנות בבית, תחושות סכנה וחוסן לאומי גבוהים יותר, כך תפיסת החוסן הקהילתי גבוהה יותר. ג. בניגוד לחוסן הקהילתי הגבוה שנמצא בקרב תושבי הדרום, ממוצע החוסן הלאומי במדגם הדרום נמוך באופן מובהק, בהשוואה לממוצע החוסן הלאומי במדגם הארצי. ממצאי המחקר הנוכחי מראים שככול שהנבדק חש מוגן יותר בביתו, גילו גבוה יותר, מידת הדתיות שלו גבוהה יותר והוא נוטה יותר לעמדות פוליטיות יותר ימניות, כך תפיסת החוסן הלאומי גבוהה יותר. מעניין לציין, שמבין מנבאי החוסן הלאומי, תחושת המוגנות בבית היא המנבא השני הכי טוב מבין המשתנים שנכללו במשוואה. ד. תחושות הסכנה בקרב נחקרי מדגם הדרום גבוהות באופן מובהק מתחושות הסכנה במדגם הארצי. מעבר לכך, נמצא ככל שהפרט מתגורר בקהילה קטנה יותר (ובמידת מה גם שיתופית יותר), בעל תפיסת חוסן קהילתי גבוהה יותר ותפיסת חוסן לאומי נמוכה יותר, תחושת הסכנה נמוכה יותר, אף אם הוא מתגורר בישוב הקרוב יותר לגבול. ראוי לציין כי תחושות הסכנה הן המשתנה שבו נמצאו ההבדלים הגדולים ביותר בין תושבי עוטף עזה לבין תושבי מועצה אזורית גליל עליון והמדגם הארצי.

שתי שאלות נוספות נכללו במחקר זה: "באיזו מידה חשת, במהלך הסבב האחרון, שמדינת ישראל תומכת ועוזרת לתושבי הדרום שחוו ירי רקטות?" ו"באיזו מידה חשת שמדינת ישראל תומכת ועוזרת לתושבי הדרום בין סבבי הלחימה?" התוצאות הראו כי כשני שלישים מהנחקרים חשבו שרמת התמיכה בשני המקרים הייתה נמוכה או נמוכה מאד. ממצא מדאיג נוסף הראה כי ככול שהנחקרים מתגוררים בקרבה גדולה יותר לגבול, כך הם מדווחים על תחושה רבה יותר שאינם זוכים לתמיכה מהמדינה.

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רביעי, 01 ינואר 2020 10:17

FEMA, 2019 National Preparedness Report

Bibliographic details:

FEMA, 2019 National Preparedness Report, US department of homeland security

 

Abstract:

The National Preparedness Report summarizes the progress made and challenges that remain in building and sustaining the capabilities needed to prevent, protect against, mitigate, respond to, and recover from the threats, hazards and incidents that pose the greatest risk to the Nation. As a requirement of the Post-Katrina Emergency Management Reform Act of 2006 and a key element of the National Preparedness System, this annual report offers all levels of government, the private and nonprofit sectors, and the public practical insights into preparedness that support decisions about program priorities, resource allocation, and community actions. The 2019 National Preparedness Report (2019 Report) presents an overview of the five preparedness mission areas—Prevention, Protection, Mitigation, Response, and Recovery— and describes major findings identified through community-wide research and engagement. The report covers calendar year 2018 and contains: An Introduction and Timeline of Incidents; ▪ A snapshot of preparedness grant allocations; ▪ Cross-cutting preparedness trends identified through community Threat and Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment (THIRA)/ Stakeholder Preparedness Review (SPR) submissions; ▪ Report Findings that assess mission area successes and challenges; ▪ Preparedness in Practice callouts that highlight real-world examples of whole community efforts; ▪ Actionable information to help individuals increase personal- and community-level preparedness; and ▪ A Conclusion that contains a discussion on the evolution of measuring preparedness and future assessment efforts.

Link: https://www.fema.gov/sites/default/files/2020-03/fema_national-preparedness-report-2019.pdf

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European Environment Agency (2020) The European environment: State and outlook 2020, Knowledge for transition to a sustainable Europe (SOER 2020). European Environment Agency.

Abstract:

In 2020, Europe faces environmental challenges of unprecedented scale and urgency. Although EU environment and climate policies have delivered substantial benefits over recent decades, Europe faces persistent problems in areas such as biodiversity loss, resource use, climate change impacts and environmental risks to health and well-being. Global megatrends such as demographic change are intensifying many environmental challenges, while rapid technological change brings new risks and uncertainties.

Recognising these challenges, the EU has committed to a range of long-term sustainability goals with the overall aim of ‘living well, within the limits of our planet’. Achieving these goals will not be possible without a rapid and fundamental shift in the character and ambition of Europe’s responses.

Europe needs to find ways to transform the key societal systems that drive environment and climate pressures and health impacts — rethinking not just technologies and production processes but also consumption patterns and ways of living. This will require immediate and concerted action, engaging diverse policy areas and actors across society in enabling systemic change.

Webpage: https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/soer-2020

 

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National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2020. Strengthening Post-Hurricane Supply Chain Resilience: Observations from Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25490.

Abstract:

Resilient supply chains are crucial to maintaining the consistent delivery of goods and services to the American people. The modern economy has made supply chains more interconnected than ever, while also expanding both their range and fragility. In the third quarter of 2017, Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria revealed some significant vulnerabilities in the national and regional supply chains of Texas, Florida, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico. The broad impacts and quick succession of these three hurricanes also shed light on the effectiveness of the nation's disaster logistics efforts during response through recovery.

Drawing on lessons learned during the 2017 hurricanes, this report explores future strategies to improve supply chain management in disaster situations. This report makes recommendations to strengthen the roles of continuity planning, partnerships between civic leaders with small businesses, and infrastructure investment to ensure that essential supply chains will remain operational in the next major disaster. Focusing on the supply chains food, fuel, water, pharmaceutical, and medical supplies, the recommendations of this report will assist the Federal Emergency Management Agency as well as state and local officials, private sector decision makers, civic leaders, and others who can help ensure that supply chains remain robust and resilient in the face of natural disasters.

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Bibliographic details:

Ager, A., Baillie Smith, M., Barbelet, V., Carpenter, S., Carter, W., Cartwright, A., .. & Halff, K. (2015). World disasters report: focus on local actors, the key to humanitarian effectiveness.

Abstract:

Local actors are often the most effective in conducting humanitarian operations. However, despite their critical role, they struggle to attract the funding and support they need. The 2015 World Disasters Report – launched by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) – examines the complexities and challenges local actors face in scaling-up and sustaining their humanitarian response.

Although widely recognized, the effectiveness of local or national humanitarian organizations is not reflected in humanitarian financing or coordination structures. The Report found, for example, that just 1.6 per cent of funding for humanitarian assistance is channeled directly to national and local NGOs.  It presents the case for a shift towards the “localization” of aid and a more equal partnerships between international and local actors.

Chapter 1 presents the variations in interpretation of who are local actors and what it means to work with them. It will also highlight the dilemmas and some of the consequences of current practices.  Chapter 2 is a summary of a global study and presents a clear message that investment in capacity development pays off in the long term in cases where it is driven by a real local need, where local actors are active in programme design and where cultural values are mixed with creative methods, rather than merely fulfilling donor requirements or facilitating delivery. Chapter 3 points out that the current profile of local actors in normative frameworks for disaster risk management is growing progressively stronger at both the international and the national levels, but the access of local actors to key decision-making forums has not yet caught up.

What the international community has been funding and where such funding has gone is the focus of Chapter 4. Chapters 5 and 6 focus on how both international and local actors had to adapt to such changes. Chapter 7 brings in an aspect that cuts across all crises, whether conflict or disasters resulting from natural hazards – technology in the hands of the population and used in either organic or organized ways by local actors is redefining the way crises are managed and dealt with. The chapter poses a central question: to what extent would technology contribute to changing the relationship between international and local actors or put local actors in the lead, thus altering any balance of power?

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Ye, M., & Aldrich, D. P. (2020). How Natural Hazards Impact the Social Environment for Vulnerable Groups: An Empirical Investigation in Japan. Available at SSRN.

Abstract:

Much research has demonstrated that vulnerable people fare more poorly than non-vulnerable ones in disasters and crises across a variety of outcomes – including mental and physical health, disaster aid received, re-housing processes, and overall satisfaction with recovery. But little is known about how natural disasters change the social and political environment for those vulnerable groups. Some have argued that natural disasters raise the consciousness of civil society and decision makers so that conditions improve for vulnerable groups, while others believe that disasters have little or even negative impact on their status in society. This paper uses a new panel dataset across 17 years (1999 through 2015) of Japan’s 47 prefectures to investigate how disasters impact discrimination rates for vulnerable groups, including women, the elderly, foreigners, and those with disabilities. Controlling for demographic and social factors we find that disasters actually reduce discrimination against certain vulnerable groups – especially women and the elderly – while having no measurable impact on discrimination against other groups – foreigners and the disabled. These results bring with them important policy recommendations for local residents, disaster managers, and decision makers.

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Kahn, M. E., Mohaddes, K., Ng, R. N., Pesaran, M. H., Raissi, M., & Yang, J. C. (2019). Long-term macroeconomic effects of climate change: A cross-country analysis (No. w26167). National Bureau of Economic Research.

Abstract:

This study treats the long-term impact of climate change on economic activity across countries, using a stochastic growth model where labor productivity is affected by country-specific climate variables—defined as deviations of temperature and precipitation from their historical norms. Using a panel data set of 174 countries over the years 1960 to 2014, it was found that per-capita real output growth is adversely affected by persistent changes in the temperature above or below its historical norm, but it did not obtain any statistically significant effect for changes in precipitation. This counterfactual analysis suggests that a persistent increase in average global temperature by 0.04°C per year, in the absence of mitigation policies, reduces world real GDP per capita by more than 7 percent by 2100. On the other hand, abiding by the Paris Agreement, thereby limiting the temperature increase to 0.01°C per annum, reduces the loss substantially to about 1 percent. These effects vary significantly across countries depending on the pace of temperature increases and variability of climate conditions. This study also provides supplementary evidence using data on a sample of 48 U.S. states between 1963 and 2016, and show that climate change has a long-lasting adverse impact on real output in various states and economic sectors, and on labor productivity and employment.

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“The World Climate and Security Report 2020.” Product of the Expert Group of the International Military Council on Climate and Security. Authors: Steve Brock (CCS), Bastien Alex (IRIS), Oliver-Leighton Barrett (CCS), Francesco Femia (CCS), Shiloh Fetzek (CCS), Sherri Goodman (CCS), Deborah Loomis (CCS), Tom Middendorp (Clingendael), Michel Rademaker (HCSS), Louise van Schaik (Clingendael), Julia Tasse (IRIS), Caitlin Werrell (CCS). Edited by Francesco Femia & Caitlin Werrell. Published by the Center for Climate and Security, an institute of the Council on Strategic Risks. Feb 2020.

Abstract:

The inaugural World Climate and Security Report 2020 from the Expert Group of the International Military Council on Climate and Security (IMCCS) provides global and regional assessments of the security risks of a changing climate, as well as opportunities for addressing them. It is the first report of its kind and is intended to inform future climate and security policy and analysis. The last chapter offers a comprehensive set of conclusions and recommendations for a path forward towards global security cooperation on climate change. This includes the overarching recommendation that national, regional, and international security institutions and militaries around the world acknowledge climate security risks and advance climate resilience, especially water and food security and their associated effects on stability, conflict and displacement, in their primary mission sets or lines of effort.

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Kubisch, S., Guth, J., Keller, S., Bull, M. T., Keller, L., & Braun, A. C. (2020). The contribution of tsunami evacuation analysis to evacuation planning in Chile: Applying a multi-perspective research design. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 101462.

Abstract:

Research on evacuation behavior in natural disasters provides a valuable contribution in the development of effective short- and long-term strategies in disaster risk management (DRM). Many studies address evacuation simulation utilizing mathematical modeling approaches or GIS-based simulation. In this contribution, we perform a detailed analysis of an entire evacuation process from the decision to evacuate right up to the arrival at a safe zone. We apply a progressive research design in the community of Talcahuano, Chile by means of linking a social science approach, deploying standardized questionnaires for the tsunami affected population, and a GIS-based simulation. The questionnaire analyzes evacuation behavior in both an event-based historical scenario and a hypothetical future scenario. Results reveal three critical issues: evacuation time, distance to the evacuation zone, and method of transportation. In particular, the excessive use of cars has resulted in congestion of street sections in past evacuations, and will most probably also pose a problem in a future evacuation event. As evacuation by foot is generally recommended by DRM, the results are extended by a GIS-based modeling simulating evacuation by foot. Combining the findings of both approaches allows for added value, providing more comprehensive insights into evacuation planning. Future research may take advantage of this multi-perspective research design, and integrate social science findings in a more detailed manner. Making use of invaluable local knowledge and past experience of the affected population in evacuation planning is likely to help decrease the magnitude of a disaster, and, ultimately, save lives.

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