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Reducing Disaster Risks from Natural Hazards

Chapter 5 | Conclusions and Recommendations

The World Bank is successfully supporting clients to increasingly take up DRR actions through strategic and comprehensive country engagement. The World Bank has developed a large portfolio of lending and nonlending DRR activities, tripling its support over the past decade. The World Bank focuses its DRR work on those countries with the most serious natural hazards. It often uses multiple and synergistic pillars of DRR engagement that include hazard identification, resilient infrastructure, early-warning and preparedness activities, and, occasionally, financial protection. DRR has been increasingly mainstreamed into sector operations across all key GPs. Support for DRR in IDA, SIDS, and IDA-FCV countries has been particularly comprehensive. The World Bank has also shifted from post-disaster response toward predisaster risk reduction and has built risk reduction activities into nearly all disaster response operations. This large program of DRR is likely to contribute to climate change adaptation.

The increasing coverage of DRR across countries is driven by a corporate prioritization of disaster support, the availability of dedicated trust funds, and client demand. The growth and expansion of DRR support is associated with the World Bank’s corporate prioritization of climate change adaptation, IDA’s special theme on climate change, the technical and financial presence of GFDRR, and the supportive global authorizing environment, including the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, which may have influenced donor funding and client demand.

The World Bank has shown that it is able to overcome political and financial constraints to DRR client uptake by engaging the right decision makers using rigorous evidence and by building on disaster reconstruction efforts. Analytical work that quantified risks, assessed costs and benefits, and communicated impacts has highly influenced DRR uptake. Another key determinant was the chosen government entry point: there was faster progress and better agency coordination when the World Bank worked with ministries of finance as compared with when it mainly worked with disaster agencies. Two other key client entry points have been the World Bank’s support for disaster reconstruction and the credibility earned from sustained sector engagements. Targeting subnational entities that can implement DRR policy measures and investments, including capacity building, has also been key to achieving downstream DRR effects. However, in SIDS, the World Bank should seek further opportunities to reduce donor fragmentation and ensure that analytical work is not excessive, does not overwhelm country capacity, and has a line of sight to investment or policy reform programs.

However, there are gaps in coverage for some regions, sectors, and hazards that require attention. There are DRR coverage gaps in Europe and Central Asia and the Middle East and North Africa for all serious hazards. There are constraints to DRR lending in many IBRD countries in these regions. In these regions, there are many small clients with limited lending envelopes, and in the Middle East and North Africa, there are conflict-affected countries where immediate conflict-related needs and governance concerns may be priorities. Because many of these countries are borrowing from IBRD for infrastructure, they have the potential to address DRR through mainstreaming. Although the World Bank has made significant progress in mainstreaming DRR in lending operations, there has been less uptake in some sectors: the share of DRR mainstreamed lending operations is relatively low in Agriculture and Food and Energy and Extractives, and mainstreaming is uneven across subsectors. DRR mainstreaming in Transport is less frequent for operations in Europe and Central Asia and in Sub-Saharan Africa. Some hazard types that are rarer (tsunamis and volcanic eruptions) or less catastrophic (landslides) receive less attention in World Bank engagements than do others (floods, cyclones, droughts, and earthquakes). Gaps in coverage could be addressed by mainstreaming DRR considerations into existing sectoral engagements in these countries and by undertaking efforts to overcome political and financial constraints to DRR uptake.

While the World Bank is conducting analytical work on the needs of disaster- vulnerable groups, there has been slow progress on incorporating their needs into lending projects. The World Bank is increasingly identifying and addressing the needs of women, who are disproportionately impacted by disasters; however, for other groups, there is slow progress and limited reporting on DRR benefits. Few operations integrate the needs of identified disaster-vulnerable groups, including persons with disabilities, the elderly, children, and youth.

Although DRR engagements in conflict-affected situations have addressed disaster vulnerability, they have missed opportunities to use conflict-sensitive approaches to mitigate conflict risks and to pursue peace-building opportunities. Conflict can be a key driver of disaster risk, and disaster risk may exacerbate preexisting conflicts and increase the risk of violence. Tools for conducting disaster needs assessments were not designed to integrate conflict considerations. DRR projects in conflict-affected areas have often not been designed with a conflict-sensitive approach. Efforts to develop a DRR-FCV program in the World Bank have been progressing slowly.

There is a need to bring a service provision lens to mature DRR engagements, shifting focus to prioritize issues of sustainability and maintenance, including for resilient infrastructure and EWSs. DRR investment projects have often effectively supported relevant infrastructure, but most do not explicitly address O&M that is required for long-term resilience. This shortcoming is more evident in core disaster projects mapped to the Urban, Disaster Risk Management, Resilience, and Land GP, as compared with sectoral infrastructure projects. The World Bank has been more effective at developing EWS infrastructure than in delivering EWS services, such as forecasting capacity and community preparedness.

There is also a need for the World Bank to consider the context and circumstances in which disaster insurance should be made a priority. Disaster insurance activities have had a limited impact on transferring disaster risk, as insurance programs have had difficulty in reaching scale. In many cases, the benefits from risk transferred and payouts made have been relatively modest compared with the cost of premiums paid and the intensive time, resources, and effort put into product development. For many clients, contingent finance or other mechanisms may be preferred. However, insurance activities have contributed to awareness raising, capacity building, and product development.

The World Bank’s frequent inability to demonstrate the effects of its DRR activities on reduced exposure and vulnerability has consequences for its ability to make a development case for risk reduction. Most DRR operations are not providing sufficient information to establish the level of DRR being achieved. This inhibits an understanding of the level at which DRR contributes to development impacts, such as reduced economic loss and mortality. This is especially important for resilient infrastructure investments, as most of these projects lack information on resilience standards, even after they are completed. Developing an evidence base on the impacts and cost-effectiveness of NBS is also critical for unlocking internal barriers that impede their uptake. Developing evidence on the results of policy changes is also critical for DPOs, which often lack such evidence.

The World Bank has been able to achieve highly successful results on DRR with sustained engagement, prioritization in policy dialogue, sizable lending programs, access to trust funds, and catalyzation of financing from others. By necessity, it can do this for only a limited number of cases at a time, requiring consideration of when its involvement in a program has been sufficient and when to change course to tackle the next difficult problem where it has a comparative advantage.

Recommendations

Recommendation 1. Incorporate DRR activities in regions and sectors and for hazards that exhibit significant coverage gaps. In countries facing high risks from disasters caused by natural hazards, the World Bank can address coverage gaps through analytical work, mainstreaming, or core DRR activities, including by (i) conducting country-level analytics on disaster costs and impacts of DRR for key sectors, (ii) relying on country management to proactively engage clients on DRR and encourage task teams to integrate DRR considerations in projects, (iii) integrating DRR specialists into sector dialogue, and (iv) assessing the need for coverage of low-frequency but catastrophic hazards such as volcanic eruptions and tsunamis.

Recommendation 2. Identify and measure the effects of DRR activities on exposure and vulnerability to strengthen the development case to clients facing serious disaster risks. The generation of ex post DRR evidence on probable outcomes involves clearer articulation in project documents of the particular resilience standards used for infrastructure in that context, use of and reporting on verification mechanisms for compliance with these standards, and greater use of ex post modeling of the incremental impacts of DRR activities on expected damage, loss, and mortality from disasters. This evidence generation can occur in projects or from results assessments of DRR activities implemented in different contexts.

Recommendation 3. Integrate the needs of populations that are disproportionately vulnerable to disasters caused by natural hazards into DRR project targeting and design, implementation, and results reporting. This can be accomplished by strengthening collaboration between the GPs working on disaster activities with poverty and social development experts in the World Bank through the development and application of data, tools, analyses, and tracking systems.

Recommendation 4. In countries affected by serious natural hazards and fragility and conflict risks, identify and assess the ways in which hazards and conflict interrelate, and use this knowledge to inform country engagement and project design. This should be part of the World Bank’s efforts to identify and address compound risks at the country level. This may require strengthened collaboration and knowledge exchange between World Bank DRR and FCV teams, the use of integrated multirisk analysis tools, and adapted program designs that address the interlinkages between disaster and FCV risks.

THE CDC FIELD EPIDEMIOLOGY MANUAL

Natural and Human-Made Disasters

Ronald Waldman

  • Historical Highlights of the Use of Field Epidemiology in Humanitarian Emergencies
  • Role of Field Epidemiologists in Humanitarian Emergency Response
  • Common Issues

Every year, approximately 400 natural disasters occur worldwide. Added to these are 30–40 armed conflicts ( 1 ). Together, these and other emergencies imperil the health of hundreds of millions of people and substantially increase levels of morbidity and mortality. The future may bring more calamity to more places around the world; climate change is a scientific certainty, and with it comes an increased level of dangerous weather events in all coastal areas around the globe.

Natural events and human-made emergencies (e.g., armed conflict; climate change; and “development disasters,” such as those ensuing from flooding upstream of dam construction or excessive damage from earthquakes where structures have not been built to code) frequently occur in relatively remote, difficult-to-reach locations, often in the poorer countries of the world that are least able to cope. The tasks of field epidemiologists who participate in response efforts include (1) accurately determining the number of people affected, (2) calculating rates of morbidity and mortality, (3) assessing the health-related needs of the population, (4) establishing priorities for providing health services, (5) monitoring progress toward rehabilitation and recovery, (6) evaluating the results of emergency interventions, and (7) improving future responses by communicating the consequences of these emergencies.

The approach to the way supplies and services are delivered to emergency-affected populations has changed radically during the past 50 years. The application of epidemiologic principles to emergency response is generally considered to have begun during the massive international relief effort mounted during the civil war in Nigeria during the late 1960s. During that war, which resulted in widespread starvation, massive internal displacement, and high rates of mortality, epidemiologists developed methods to help determine the health status of the affected populations so that appropriate assistance could be delivered ( 2 ). Nutritional surveillance evolved over subsequent years, and, by the late 1970s, internationally approved guidelines for measuring nutritional status had been developed ( 3 ).

Toward the end of the 1970s, the genocidal practices of the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia resulted in a massive exodus of survivors to Thailand, where hundreds of thousands of people were given refuge in several large camps. These so-called “death camps” quickly became the sites of numerous outbreaks of disease, but the extent and principal causes of morbidity and mortality were measured in quantifiable terms only when epidemiologists from the Center for Disease Control (later Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), working together with colleagues from the International Committee of the Red Cross and a group of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), instituted a formal disease surveillance system and conducted methodologically sound surveys ( 4 ).

Before the regular use of field epidemiology techniques, emergency response was guided mainly by the best intentions of relatively inexperienced medical and surgical teams with inappropriate skills and inadequate logistical support. Doctors would build makeshift clinics, throw open the doors, and provide services to people who were able to access them—in most instances, only a small proportion of the affected population. Available services frequently did not match the public health needs of the population. Planners and managers were in the unenviable position of directing major relief operations with little information to guide their efforts ( 5 ). However, as sound epidemiologic practices emerged and were more regularly applied, reasonably accurate denominators on which to calculate rates of illness and death were generated and a more disciplined approach to the delivery of humanitarian assistance in the health sector evolved.

Unfortunately, disasters that have needed more honed epidemiologic approaches have continued to occur regularly. Examples include repeated famines and conflicts (the two are not unrelated) in the Horn of Africa; cyclones and tsunamis leading to massive flooding in countries bordering the Bay of Bengal and elsewhere in the Indian Ocean; earthquakes and hurricanes in the Caribbean and Central America; and wars in the Balkans, the Middle East, and Central Africa. All of these required distinct responses, but eventually, because of the development and application of epidemiologic techniques, including more formal approaches to rapid assessment, surveillance, and impact evaluation, patterns of morbidity and mortality emerged. In addition, training programs were established that resulted in an emergency response workforce that was more knowledgeable, more sophisticated, and more capable of reducing illness and saving more lives in less time ( Box 22.1 ) ( 6 ).

One notable watershed occurred in the wake of the Rwanda genocide of 1994, when more than 500,000 refugees fled that country to then-Zaire, with many settling in a few camps near the northern tip of Lake Kivu. Within weeks, an estimated 45,000 refugees had died of cholera, despite the presence of hundreds of nongovernmental organizations, United Nations agencies, military medical contingents from at least nine Western countries, and many other public health officials ( 7 ). The collective failure to respond effectively to this situation clearly underscored the need for the emergency relief community to develop indicators for a successful intervention and to work to achieve those indicators in every emergency. This need led to development of the Sphere Project and its accompanying Handbook ( Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Humanitarian Response ) that remains obligatory reading for persons working in this field (8). In addition to establishing standards in key areas (shelter, food security, food aid and nutrition, water and sanitation, and health services, and the cross-cutting areas of gender and protection), the Sphere Project has provided opportunities for epidemiologists and other public health experts to agree on a relatively standardized approach to emergency relief. A fourth edition of this essential Handbook will be published in Fall, 2018.

More recently, notable humanitarian crises resulting from natural disasters have included a massive earthquake in Haiti (2010); flooding that displaced 20 million people in Pakistan (2010); several typhoons in the Philippines, including Typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda in 2013; and the ongoing (2017) severe drought in the Horn of Africa. Human-made emergencies commanding the attention of the international humanitarian community have included ongoing conflicts in South Sudan, Central African Republic, and throughout the Middle East. Although the peer-reviewed literature addressing responses to such disasters remains relatively sparse, field epidemiologists preparing to respond to future crises should be encouraged to learn from these case studies.

The principal objectives of epidemiologic field investigations and response in emergency settings are to

  • Establish the magnitude and distribution of the public health consequences of the event.
  • Assess the size and health needs of the affected population.
  • Help provide and promote epidemiologically derived data as the principal basis for resource allocation.
  • Help guide implementation of public health programs to minimize postemergency morbidity and mortality.
  • Monitor progress of the relief effort.
  • Evaluate the effectiveness of the relief effort.

The field epidemiologist is a core member of the emergency response team. Increasingly, the international response to emergencies is organized in a command-and-control manner, in accordance with the Incident Command System (see Chapter 16 ) or similar systems approaches ( 9 ). Knowledge of the organizational structure of the relief effort and identification of the decision-makers is important, as are being a team player and understanding the roles of other team members. In the face of tragedy, many unseasoned hands will adopt an “act first– think later” approach and view the methodical collection and analysis of data as a frivolous, time-wasting activity. In these instances, the field epidemiologist must be an affirmative voice of reason—strongly advancing an evidence-based approach to health interventions that maximizes benefit to the affected population.

Although no cookbook approach exists to emergency response, flexibility and sound judgment are hallmarks for the successful use of field epidemiology. Accordingly, a flexible framework of steps for the epidemiologist includes

  • Determining the impact of the event on the public’s health by establishing rates of illness and death with an optimal attainable level of accuracy (note: “the perfect should not be the enemy of the good”). In doing so, it is, of course, essential to focus on the determinations of both numerators (cases and deaths) and denominators (total population and, wherever possible, age and sex breakdowns).
  • Initiating disease surveillance as quickly as possible, beginning with a minimum amount of data to collect and augmenting as deemed appropriate and feasible.
  • Identifying personal, household, and environmental risk factors for elevated rates of illness and death.
  • Advocating for the early initiation of essential public health interventions and disease-control programs on the basis of knowledge of the actual and potential distribution of diseases in the population.
  • Arguing forcefully that health actions of lesser priority be deferred.
  • Becoming an essential member of the health response team by attending appropriate meetings; working with public health officials and other responders from different organizations, including government officials; and providing frequently updated reports about the situation to those who have a need to know.

This last point (i.e., providing situation reports) is critical; in emergency response, “consequential epidemiology” needs to be practiced ( 10 ). The contribution of epidemiologists reflects their ability to provide timely and accurate data in a way that decision-makers can easily understand, analyze, and use for action. The use of those data should enable effective implementation of appropriate public health measures. Conversely, collecting and providing potentially useful information that decision-makers do not act on might be viewed, in part, as a failure of field epidemiology, as is the implementation of health interventions that relevant data do not support. Thus, epidemiologic skills are necessary but not sufficient: equally critical are the abilities to communicate effectively, advocate successfully, and provide strong leadership in support of the policymakers directly responsible for consequential actions.

In its early stages, the emergency relief environment is always chaotic. However, every responder has the same essential needs: food, water, shelter, transportation, communication, and a place to sleep. Thus, the field epidemiologist’s first priority is to arrange to meet these basic needs. This is important because the more independent one can be, the less others will have to divert attention from their work to provide assistance.

Hiring staff is another early priority, especially in international emergency relief. Because field epidemiology is a population-based discipline, the epidemiology team should include members who know the local language, geography, and customs. Therefore, recruiting and retaining people who can be relied on to be effective liaisons with the local communities is a high priority. Although English-speaking translators are highly valued, because they do not always represent the community and are unlikely to be professionally trained, information they provide should be carefully assessed and verified.

Establishing Rates of Illness, Injury, and Death

In most emergency relief settings, accurate measurement of the size of the affected population and its current health status is missing and difficult to establish. For the field epidemiologist, though, it is critical to determine a reasonably precise denominator on which to base the calculation of rates, such as crude, age-, sex-, and disease-specific death; prevalence of moderate, severe, and global acute malnutrition in the affected community; incidence of high-priority conditions; and access to use of health services. Determining rates is essential for comparing population groups and prioritizing public health interventions. A variety of methodologic options can be used to calculate population size, ranging from the more basic, such as extrapolating from the number of people in a sample of dwelling units, to the more sophisticated, such as using aerial photography and/or satellite imagery. The field epidemiologist needs to consider the context in which the relief effort is occurring to select the best method—one that provides reasonably accurate numbers in a culturally and contextually sensitive way.

Rapid Assessment

In 1980, in one of the many emergencies on the Horn of Africa, women were observed to be wearing no jewelry, a sign that all valuables had been sold to purchase food that had become available at exorbitant prices. There was one exception, however: almost all women wore a thin string around their necks with a small, spoon-shaped pendant attached to it. The significance of this oddity eluded field epidemiologists assessing the health status of the population until a visiting ophthalmologist mentioned that this population suffered from an unusually high prevalence of trachoma. The spoon-shaped device, it was learned, was used to remove inverted eyelashes, an action that helped relieve the irritation and pain associated with the scratched and ulcerated cornea that are a feature of this disease. Their ubiquity was a testament to the importance of the disease—and keen observation was the key to diagnosing this public health problem.

__________ Source: R. Waldman, unpublished data.

Field epidemiologists play a key role in the earliest stages of any relief effort. In addition to an appreciation for quantifiable data and for how and when to collect it, the “shoe leather” component of epidemiology is valuable in and of itself for conducting an initial rapid assessment. A wealth of information can be gleaned from observation during a walk-through of the affected area if one knows what to look for and how to employ basic qualitative techniques.

  • If commodities are being sold or traded in the marketplace, then their price, compared with preemergency prices, indicates their availability or scarcity.
  • Black markets spring up quickly in postdisaster settings, and the willingness of people to make major sacrifices to pay for essential commodities indicates dire need.
  • Indicators such as the amount of and type of jewelry being worn can be meaningful ( Box 22.2 ). The absence of traditional adornment in a society in which it is customary might signify food insecurity and that everything of value already has been sold.

Interviews with community leaders, transect walks through affected areas, and results from a constellation of methods that frequently are grouped as participatory rapid appraisals can be useful even before the analysis of survey data that might provide more accurate information but at the cost of timeliness. Of paramount importance for the field epidemiologist is reaching the disaster location as quickly as possible, visiting all affected areas and population groups, and helping the relief community gather, collate, and assess the value of all information. Postemergency settings are dynamic, but ultimately decisions about public health and health service delivery must be made from day 1 on the basis of existing evidence ( 11 ).

As valuable as nonquantitative data might be, the lack of routinely collected health information means that, as soon as is feasible, surveys will need to be conducted. A precise sampling frame will be difficult to establish at first, and careful judgment is needed to ensure that samples drawn from the population are representative. However, in most circumstances, a less than optimally representative systematically chosen sample will be superior to a convenience sample, especially if the results are to guide the equitable distribution of commodities and services.

A commonly used survey method is two-stage cluster sampling , first developed by the World Health Organization to measure vaccination coverage rates ( 12 ). The logistical demands of this method are far less than for either simple random sampling or systematic random sampling because relatively few clusters need to be visited to obtain statistically valid results with a reasonable degree of precision. Although sample sizes can be relatively large, the advantages of using this method usually outweigh the disadvantages. Nonetheless, two distinct disadvantages should be noted:

  • Cluster sampling is not well suited for measuring characteristics that are not homogenously distributed in the population. For example, if malnutrition is clumped in certain areas, then cluster sampling might miss it entirely or, conversely, overidentify it, resulting in skewed, nonrepresentative values for the population as a whole.
  • Cluster sampling can be difficult to explain to decision-makers.

Finally, a frequently overlooked problem with surveys is that nonsampling error is likely to be more important than the disadvantages of any sampling method. Surveyors need to be carefully trained to understand the objectives of the survey and the importance of collecting accurate and unbiased information. When people affected by an emergency have lost their possessions or suffered other shocks, they can be eager to please those they perceive to be in a position to help them by providing answers they think the surveyors want to hear, resulting in a sincere, but inaccurate, picture of reality. For example, people might not report household deaths because they fear having their rations decreased. Therefore, the field epidemiologist needs to be aware of the many real and potential biases in obtaining accurate information from an emergency-affected population and must take steps to ensure that none of the epidemiologic activities inadvertently contributes to further deterioration of the situation. For epidemiologists, as for clinicians, “do no harm” is an important rule.

Organizing Priority Interventions

The main goals of emergency relief are to save lives and restore individuals and communities to their preemergency conditions. Although individual-and population-directed health interventions are important in many settings, other types of interventions might take precedence. In the book, Refugee Health , the medical relief organization Doctors Without Borders suggested 10 top priorities in disaster response ( 13 ). Of the top five, only one—measles vaccination—is a health-specific intervention, and its importance might have diminished since publication of that book as more countries have achieved high measles vaccine coverage rates through routine health services. (In situations of protracted conflict, however, where primary healthcare services have been unavailable to the population for some time, vaccination coverage levels can fall dramatically. As a result, measles outbreaks have occurred increasingly throughout the Middle East and in migrant populations in Europe.) The other priorities are initial assessment; water and sanitation; food and nutrition; and shelter and site planning. Although these are clearly related to public health, in most international emergency responses they are considered to be distinct from the health sector.

Some humanitarian interventions address basic needs of the emergency-affected population slowly and even inadequately. For example, in the area of nutrition, field epidemiologists have been called on to identify, diagnose, and design appropriate interventions for rare conditions (e.g., scurvy, pellagra, and beriberi) while simultaneously implementing surveillance for acute moderate and severe malnutrition. Although relief team members who are experts on specific problems understandably will focus on those problems, the field epidemiologist needs to address the overall spectrum of the relief effort and promote the most appropriate interventions, regardless of the sectors to which the interventions might belong.

Public health surveillance is a critical element of disaster response, and its establishment usually becomes the responsibility of the on-site epidemiology team. In humanitarian settings, epidemiologists attempting to implement effective surveillance might have to address several challenges, including

  • Balancing speed and accuracy in adverse conditions.
  • Integrating multiple sources of sometimes conflicting data while determining which are credible and which are not.
  • Soliciting others to participate in the surveillance effort when they might not assign it the same priority the epidemiologist does.
  • Assisting decision-makers in using surveillance data to take action.

Rapidly established, well-monitored, and widely used surveillance systems have been instrumental in preventing deaths as, for example, in the aftermath of the Asian tsunami of December 1994, when on-scene, experienced epidemiologists helped conduct effective surveillance.

Conditions targeted for surveillance vary in relation to specifics of the setting. In most developing countries, at the start it may be sufficient to target a simple surveillance system toward syndromic presentations and easily recognizable conditions, such as acute lower respiratory illness (a proxy for pneumonia), acute watery or bloody diarrhea (cholera, dysentery), fever with or without stiff neck (malaria, meningitis), and measles. In other settings—especially in middle-and higher income countries—the focus might be on measuring the needs of chronically ill persons who might be cut off from their medications or procedures; in these situations, such conditions might be more prevalent than common acute communicable diseases. In all settings, surveillance should focus on the most vulnerable segments of the population (e.g., infants, children, older persons, women, destitute and underserved persons, and persons with special needs). To ensure they are not neglected, epidemiologists should disaggregate data to facilitate identification of health problems in these groups.

Coordination

Emergency relief almost always occurs in emotionally charged environments. Although the need for highly coordinated action is universally recognized (some have suggested that “poor coordination” should be recorded as a cause of death on death certificates), many responders might want to coordinate but not “be coordinated.” The most common scenario is for a health cluster to be established at the onset of the relief effort. Government officials, representatives of the World Health Organization, and a designated person from a nongovernment organization usually are assigned joint responsibility for chairing cluster meetings and overseeing their functioning. In large disasters, such as the Haiti earthquake of 2010, several hundred responders regularly attended health cluster meetings, many seeking guidance on how to respond effectively ( 14 ).

The epidemiologist, for better or for worse, frequently is thrust into a position of responsibility and authority because most responders will not be familiar with the published medical and/or public health literature and few will be able to view the chaos through the objective lens of unbiased data. Epidemiologists responding to an emergency for the first time might be unfamiliar and even uncomfortable with the amount of respect they are accorded.

Humanitarian response settings are the emergency rooms of public health. Lifesaving, irreversible decisions frequently are made in the early phases of the relief effort. A fundamental task of the field epidemiologist is collection and circulation of essential data on the health and nutritional status of the affected population as accurately as possible in the shortest possible time. The purpose of these data is to help first responders prioritize the interventions most likely to limit excess preventable death. The environment is often chaotic, uncoordinated, and characterized by logistical and resource constraints, but the epidemiologist needs to be calm, assertive, and able to convey the power of accurately collected and analyzed data. Ultimately, however, successful contribution to a disaster response will be measured not on the basis of the elegance of the epidemiologic investigations, but rather as a function of how many lives are saved ( 15 ).

  • Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters. http://www.cred.be
  • Brown RE, Mayer J. Famine and disease in Biafra: an assessment. Trop Geogr Med . 1969;21:348–52.
  • De Ville de Goyet C, Seaman J, Geijer U. The Management of Nutritional Emergencies in Large Populations . Geneva: World Health Organization; 1978.
  • Glass RI, Cates W Jr, Nieburg P, et al. Rapid assessment of health status and preventive-medicine needs of newly arrived Kampuchean refuges, Sakeo, Thailand. Lancet . 1980;1:868–72.
  • Sommer A, Mosley WH. East Bengal cyclone of November, 1970. Epidemiological approach to disaster assessment. Lancet . 1972;1:1029–36.
  • Toole MJ, Waldman RJ. Prevention of excess mortality in refugee and displaced populations in developing countries. JAMA . 1990;263:3296–302.
  • Goma Epidemiology Group. What happened in Goma, Zaire, in July 1994? Lancet . 1995;345:339–44.
  • The Sphere Project. Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster Response . 3rd ed. Geneva: The Sphere Project; 2011.
  • Southeast Alaska Petroleum Response Organization. What is the incident command system? http://www.seapro.org/pdf_ docs/ICS.Overview.pdf
  • Field Epidemiology Manual Wiki. Field epidemiology manual. https://wiki.ecdc.europa.eu/fem/w/wiki/field-epidemiology
  • Checchi F, Warsame A, Treacy-Wong V et al. Public health information in crisis-affected populations: a review of methods and their use for advocacy and action. Lancet . 2017;390:2297–313.
  • Henderson RH, Sundaresan T. Cluster sampling to assess immunization coverage: a review of experience with a simplified sampling method. Bull World Health Org . 1982;60:253–60.
  • Médecins Sans Frontières. Refugee Health—An Approach to Emergency Situations . London: Macmillan; 1997.
  • World Health Organization. Global health cluster guide. http://www.who.int/hac/global_health_cluster/guide_glossary_of_key_terms/en/
  • Waldman RJ, Toole MJ. Where is the science in humanitarian health? Lancet . 2017;390:2224–6.

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The Economic Impacts of Natural Disasters

  • < Previous chapter
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The economic impact of natural disasters has been increasing in the last decade. Lives are lost and people are disabled, sometimes for life. Even if lives are spared, harvests and livelihoods are lost, marginalizing large sections of the already poor in many countries.

This book has been a step toward bringing together varied expertise in the fi eld of the economics of natural disasters from north and south, and to look at what future research is needed in order to improve our management of disaster risks.

We conclude here with five pointers for research that could contribute most to reducing these risks and providing a clearer picture of the real costs of disasters.

The phenomenon of natural disasters has high moral imperatives linked to the tragedies of households and families. But it also has an important economic development imperative. We would like this book to encourage young economists in the future to look into this field and work on reducing the effects of natural disasters on the poor of the world.

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How to Write a Conclusion on Disaster Management

by Anam Ahmed

Published on 15 Nov 2019

Natural and man-made disasters can have a distressing impact on small businesses, which is why it’s critical to have a disaster management strategy in place. This is a plan that outlines what hazards your business is at risk of facing, what you can do to avoid or manage them and how to get your business back up and running should a disaster strike. The conclusion of your disaster management plan reiterates the salient points and provides actionable takeaways.

Re-State the Objective of Your Disaster Management Plan

Start your conclusion by reminding the reader of the goal of your disaster management plan. For example, if your business is located in an area where forest fires are common in the summer, they could have a debilitating impact on your business. As a result, the goal of your disaster management plan is to navigate the situation should a forest fire occur near your business.

By restating your goal, you provide the reader of the disaster plan the background and context they need to quickly understand the situation. For example, “Our goal is to ensure that each employee is safe if a forest fire spreads while they are at work.”

Go Over the Potential Hazards the Company Faces

In the conclusion of your natural disasters article or plan, outline the potential disasters that your company may be at risk of facing. These may include natural disasters such as floods, forest fires, earthquakes and hurricanes. It may also include man-made disasters such as theft, arson, data loss, chemical leakages or terrorist threats.

Specify what may happen to the business should such a disaster occur. For example, if your business deals with toxic chemicals, a leak could affect the environment around you and cause you to close your business for several weeks or months while clean-up takes place. This would lead to a considerable loss of income. The leak could also result in your employees getting sick or injured. This could lead to workers’ compensation claims or employee litigation.

Summarize Action Plans for Possible Hazards

In your conclusion, provide a brief summary of the plan you stated in the report. Your essay on natural disasters may include a step-by-step disaster management plan on what to do should a neighboring building catch fire. In your conclusion, you can summarize the plan in two or three sentences. For example, “Evacuate the building immediately, call 911 and notify the business owner. Once everyone is out safely, notify customers of closures or changes in schedule.”

Review Employee Training for Disaster Relief

Regardless of how many employees you have at your small business, it’s vital to make them aware of your disaster management plan. Your employees need to understand the possible natural and man-made risks to your business, and what to do when a disaster occurs. In the conclusion of your disaster management plan, provide a brief synopsis of how you will get your employees involved. For example, “We will review our fire evacuation plan with employees at every quarterly meeting so that they are up to date on emergency exit procedures. We will also provide the management team with continuity plans so they can continue to run the business effectively once the imminent threat has been removed.”

Actionable Takeaways in a Good Conclusion for Natural Disasters

A good conclusion of natural disasters planning for small business needs to include actionable advice for improvement . In your disaster management plan, it’s wise to provide a detailed list of recommendations for the business so they can better navigate the disaster. Your conclusion should summarize these recommendations. For example, “We recommend reviewing our insurance policy to ensure we are covered for any risks. We also recommend installing security cameras on the inside and outside of all exits to deter thefts from taking place.”

FVE - Federation of Veterinarians of Europe

Presentations, natural disasters and “one-health” – conclusions.

Natural disasters, like floods, earthquakes or extreme climate outbreaks, severely challenge the health and welfare of people, animals and the ecosystem. The Conference on the Natural disasters and “One – Health” Are we prepared?, focused on preparedness and management of such crisis.

About 90 participants actively engaged in the discussions recognising that humans, animals and the environment are interlinked and advocating the imperative of considering ‘One Health’ holistic approach as fundamental part of the whole exercise. Civil protection mechanisms should consider human and animal interactions as major factor in order ensure successful response.

  • Natural disasters conclusions

Veterinary Profession

Fve & cpme mou 2022.

natural disasters project conclusion

Feedback FVE/EAPHM on progress with rearing pigs with intact tails

Fve asks ema for more flexibility in using medicines, welcome to fve.

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Flood Damage Assessment and Management pp 119–120 Cite as

  • Martina Zeleňáková 11 ,
  • Lenka Gaňová 12 &
  • Daniel Constantin Diaconu 13  
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Part of the Water Science and Technology Library book series (WSTL,volume 94)

Flood events have a very special place in the field of natural disasters, the frequency of which has been increasing over the last decades, and their consequences account for 31% of economic losses. For these reasons too, flood protection solutions are taking on an increasingly international dimension, and there is increasing pressure to implement system-wide, comprehensive measures.

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Directive (2007)/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2007 on the assessment and management of flood risks (in Slovak)

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Technical University of Košice, Košice, Slovakia

Martina Zeleňáková

Lenka Gaňová

Faculty of Geography, University of Bucharest, Bucharest, Romania

Daniel Constantin Diaconu

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Zeleňáková, M., Gaňová, L., Diaconu, D.C. (2020). Conclusion. In: Flood Damage Assessment and Management. Water Science and Technology Library, vol 94. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50053-5_4

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Beyond the Headlines: Five Observations on Natural Disasters

Subscribe to this week in foreign policy, elizabeth ferris elizabeth ferris former brookings expert, research professor, institute for the study of international migration - georgetown university @beth_ferris.

May 15, 2008

Last week’s television images of desperate Burmese victims of the Nargis cyclone were followed almost immediately by reports of equally desperate Chinese searching for relatives in the rubble of a disastrous earthquake in Sichuan. These are terrible tragedies. When the statistics are finally compiled, they are likely to have resulted in tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, of deaths.

But every year for the past twenty years, more than 200 million people have been affected by natural disasters, most of which never make it to the nightly news in America. Yet the effects of even localized disasters are felt by affected families for years – long after the TV cameras have moved on to the next disaster.

Observation number 1 : The impact of a disaster is not felt evenly across communities . The human pain of natural disasters is profound, but already-vulnerable or marginalized individuals often suffer the most. People affected by natural disasters often lose family members, homes, land and property. They also lose their documentation – identity cards, birth certificates, passports and property titles – which may make it difficult to access public services. However, groups which were already vulnerable before the disaster tend to suffer disproportionately from the devastation. For example, globally, for every one adult male who drowns in a flood, there are 3-4 women who die. Most obviously, this is because in many countries girls are less likely to learn how to swim or climb trees than boys. Vulnerable groups also experience discrimination in the provision of assistance. In many camps where persons displaced by natural disasters live, food is — at least initially — more likely to go to healthy and strong men than to children or the disabled. And in New Orleans, it was the elderly, the immigrants and African-American communities who disproportionately suffered the effects of Hurricane Katrina.

Observation number 2 : Poverty exacerbates a disaster’s impact. Chances of surviving a natural disaster are much higher in developed countries than in developing ones. For example, in 1988, an earthquake registering 6.9 on the Richter scale hit Armenia, killing some 55,000 people and leaving 500,000 homeless. Less than a year later, in an even stronger earthquake, 7.1 on the Richter scale, hit San Francisco, California, killing 62 and leaving 12,000 homeless. Recovery is faster in wealthier countries. Access to assistance is often more readily available, and the delivery of that assistance is easier with paved roads and multiple communication networks. The spread of disease is less likely when medicine is on hand, sanitation can be addressed, and functioning hospitals are nearby. Furthermore, preventive measures are more likely to have been implemented where they are economically feasible; advanced levee systems, strategic urban planning, and earthquake-reinforced public buildings are seen as luxuries in many parts of the world.

Observation number 3: The government’s response to a disaster is inherently political. The way in which a government responds to natural disasters is often politically motivated and almost always has political consequences. If it responds quickly and effectively it can enjoy increased credibility and respect from its people. But if it bungles the relief effort, it may be irreparably weakened. For example, many date the fall of the Somoza regime in Nicaragua to its ineffective response to the disastrous 1972 earthquake. Presently the apparent openness of news reporting on the Chinese earthquake stands in contrast to the staged scenes of disaster relief in Burma. It is too early to judge the long-term political repercussions of the response to these two disasters, but there are likely to be consequences. Similarly, the governments’ motivations in responding to disasters are influenced by state interests and impacted by both domestic and international political pressures.

Observation number 4 : The international aid regime is imperfect. The community of governmental agencies, NGOs, and UN organizations that provides emergency relief when disasters strike can respond quickly and effectively, but such operations are far from perfect. The community excels in logistical expertise, in mobilization of funds, and in long-tested methods for getting relief to needy people quickly and fairly. Increasingly, the international community is incorporating a human rights perspective in its disaster relief efforts, as witnessed by the adoption by UN agencies of Operational Guidelines on Human Rights and Natural Disasters. But it is much more difficult to mobilize support to warn, prepare and support communities likely to experience the effects of natural disasters.

Observation number 5 : Climate change forecasts frequent and worsening disasters. Climate change affects natural disasters, both sudden-onset environmental events and long-term phenomena such as sea level rises. In fact, the severity and frequency of disasters, particularly what are called hydrometerological disasters (cyclones, hurricanes, flooding, mudslides, drought) are increasing. Natural disasters will be with us for a long time. While we cannot control where an earthquake will strike or a cyclone will turn, we can strengthen our collective ability to respond to these disasters and to mitigate their worst effects. And given the projections of the impact of climate change on natural disasters, we have no time to waste.

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Multi-hazard and Risk-informed System for Enhanced Local and Regional Disaster Risk Management

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This webinar provides a detailed summary of the HORIZON Europe project, MEDiate, highlighting the novelty and added value of the key exploitable results.

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Dr. Abdelghani Meslem is the coordinator of the MEDIate project, a Senior Research Engineer at NORSAR, a Norwegian research institute within the field of geoscience, and also affiliated to the (NMBU) as an Associate Professor in Structural Dynamics. Dr. Meslem earned his PhD in earthquake engineering from Chiba University, Japan, and he has been involved in various international projects related to seismic resilience and risk assessment studies; development and implementation of earthquake-disaster risk reduction and mitigation measurements; development of guidelines document, software and tools for risk assessment. Dr. Meslem has substantial experience in collaboration projects within industry, academia and governmental organizations. 

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Biden-Harris Administration Announces New Actions to Help Communities Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Build Back Stronger, Cleaner and More Resilient Post-Disaster

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FEMA Unlocks New Provisions for Public Assistance Projects, Advances Administration’s Goals to Reach Net-Zero by 2050 while Furthering President Biden’s Investing in America Agenda

WASHINGTON -- Expanding on the Biden-Harris Administration’s historic investments in the nation’s climate resilience, today Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas and FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell announced that the agency will expand funding to tackle the climate crisis, improve resilience and cut energy costs through net-zero projects.

For the first time, FEMA will fund net-zero energy projects, including solar, heat pumps and efficient appliances, through its largest grant program -- Public Assistance, which covers the rebuilding of schools, hospitals, fire stations and other community infrastructure investments post-disasters. FEMA is also funding net-zero energy projects for its Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP) and now offers incentives through its Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) annual grant program to encourage more communities to use net-zero projects that increase community resilience.

Today’s announcement aligns with FEMA’s Year of Resilience commitment to building local capacity to withstand tomorrow’s hazards and furthers the Administration’s goal of reaching net-zero emissions economy-wide by 2050 and ensures that rebuilt community infrastructure projects are built with the future in mind. These activities are enabled by President Biden’s  Inflation Reduction Act , the largest investment in clean energy and climate action in the history of the nation.

“Whenever and wherever a community is impacted by a natural disaster, the Department of Homeland Security is there to help recover and build back stronger,” said Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas. “Now, that work will include incorporating smart, net-zero energy techniques and technology -- like solar panels and heat pumps -- into the rebuilding of critical infrastructure like hospitals and fire stations. The Biden-Harris Investing in America agenda is proof that we can both meet the safety, security and stability needs of local communities, and do so in a responsible, climate-conscious way that increases their resilience.”

“As the increase of extreme weather hazards become more severe due to climate change, we need to adapt the way we are helping communities rebuild post-disaster,” said FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell. “Thanks to President Biden’s Investing in America agenda and the Inflation Reduction Act, FEMA will now cover the costs of net-zero energy projects since they are the single most effective measure FEMA can take to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and address the climate crisis.”

“After a disaster, communities don’t just want to build back. They want infrastructure that will last and will serve them better in a future that promises more extreme weather events fueled by the climate crisis,” said John Podesta, Senior Advisor to the President for Clean Energy Innovation and Implementation. “FEMA is doing just that thanks to President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act.”

This follows the  March 2023 announcement that FEMA will fund low-carbon construction materials for the three programs, as part of its work through the  Federal Buy Clean Initiative .

Public Assistance, Hazard Mitigation Grant Program

FEMA’s  Public Assistance program provides supplemental grants to state, tribal, territorial and local governments and certain types of private nonprofits so communities can quickly respond to and recover from major disasters or emergencies.  HMGP provides funding to state, local, tribal and territorial governments so they can develop hazard mitigation plans and rebuild in a way that reduces or mitigates future disaster losses in their communities. This grant funding is available after a presidentially declared disaster.

FEMA funding net-zero projects will cut utility costs, increase energy reliability and reduce disaster-related costs for communities. Net-zero infrastructure and buildings are more resilient and can maintain comfort and safety in emergencies such as brown-outs, black-outs and extreme temperatures.  Examples of eligible net-zero projects are solar microgrids, heat pumps, certified high-performance appliances and passive heating or cooling. States, tribes and territories can now submit expenses for these activities for FEMA reimbursement.

For any federal disaster declared after Aug. 16, 2022, applicants may now use FEMA financial assistance for unobligated projects under these programs to take advantage of this opportunity through Public Assistance and Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funding. As of Jan. 30,  more than 80 disasters have been declared across all  10 FEMA regions during this time.

Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities

Additionally, the  BRIC program that funds climate resilience annually may also take advantage of this opportunity. In the  BRIC 2023 Notice of Funding Opportunity applicants receive additional points towards their overall score when taking advantage of these climate friendly materials and cleaner energy opportunities. Additionally, states, territories and Tribes can leverage the significant resources in the Building Code Plus-Up in the 2023 Notice of Funding Opportunity to increase resilience, reduce the burden of high energy costs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions through adoption of latest consensus building and energy codes.

Disasters are becoming more frequent and severe. Since 2019, the United States has experienced an average of 20.4 weather and  climate disasters per year costing more than $1 billion each. This is an increase from an annual average of 3.3 such disasters in the 1980s. In 2023 alone, there were a record 28 confirmed weather and climate disaster events costing over $1 billion each in the United States.

The built environment contributes to nearly 40% of greenhouse gas emissions. In 2023 alone, FEMA spent over $10 billion on rebuilding and hazard mitigation construction. The federal government is the single largest purchaser of construction materials in the United States.

Acknowledging this, FEMA has joined together with 12 other federal agencies, making up 90% of federal procurement, in a  Federal Buy Clean Initiative to tackle the climate crisis. In addition to reducing activities that fuel climate-induced hazards, FEMA funding net-zero projects creates the opportunity to cut utility costs, increase energy reliability and reduce disaster-related costs for communities.

The BRIC program is a part of the Biden-Harris Administration’s unprecedented investments in communities to support an equitable transition to a sustainable economy and healthier environment for all. The program also advances the President’s  Justice40 Initiative that set a goal to deliver 40% of the overall benefits of certain federal investments to disadvantaged communities that are marginalized by underinvestment and overburdened by pollution.

Any community interested in introducing low-carbon materials or implementing net-zero energy projects can work directly with their point of contact at their FEMA region or reach out at  [email protected] or  [email protected] .

For more information on the Inflation Reduction Act and the agency’s efforts to make a more resilient, cleaner nation, visit  FEMA.gov .

National Academies Press: OpenBook

Climate Change: Evidence and Causes: Update 2020 (2020)

Chapter: conclusion, c onclusion.

This document explains that there are well-understood physical mechanisms by which changes in the amounts of greenhouse gases cause climate changes. It discusses the evidence that the concentrations of these gases in the atmosphere have increased and are still increasing rapidly, that climate change is occurring, and that most of the recent change is almost certainly due to emissions of greenhouse gases caused by human activities. Further climate change is inevitable; if emissions of greenhouse gases continue unabated, future changes will substantially exceed those that have occurred so far. There remains a range of estimates of the magnitude and regional expression of future change, but increases in the extremes of climate that can adversely affect natural ecosystems and human activities and infrastructure are expected.

Citizens and governments can choose among several options (or a mixture of those options) in response to this information: they can change their pattern of energy production and usage in order to limit emissions of greenhouse gases and hence the magnitude of climate changes; they can wait for changes to occur and accept the losses, damage, and suffering that arise; they can adapt to actual and expected changes as much as possible; or they can seek as yet unproven “geoengineering” solutions to counteract some of the climate changes that would otherwise occur. Each of these options has risks, attractions and costs, and what is actually done may be a mixture of these different options. Different nations and communities will vary in their vulnerability and their capacity to adapt. There is an important debate to be had about choices among these options, to decide what is best for each group or nation, and most importantly for the global population as a whole. The options have to be discussed at a global scale because in many cases those communities that are most vulnerable control few of the emissions, either past or future. Our description of the science of climate change, with both its facts and its uncertainties, is offered as a basis to inform that policy debate.

A CKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The following individuals served as the primary writing team for the 2014 and 2020 editions of this document:

  • Eric Wolff FRS, (UK lead), University of Cambridge
  • Inez Fung (NAS, US lead), University of California, Berkeley
  • Brian Hoskins FRS, Grantham Institute for Climate Change
  • John F.B. Mitchell FRS, UK Met Office
  • Tim Palmer FRS, University of Oxford
  • Benjamin Santer (NAS), Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
  • John Shepherd FRS, University of Southampton
  • Keith Shine FRS, University of Reading.
  • Susan Solomon (NAS), Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • Kevin Trenberth, National Center for Atmospheric Research
  • John Walsh, University of Alaska, Fairbanks
  • Don Wuebbles, University of Illinois

Staff support for the 2020 revision was provided by Richard Walker, Amanda Purcell, Nancy Huddleston, and Michael Hudson. We offer special thanks to Rebecca Lindsey and NOAA Climate.gov for providing data and figure updates.

The following individuals served as reviewers of the 2014 document in accordance with procedures approved by the Royal Society and the National Academy of Sciences:

  • Richard Alley (NAS), Department of Geosciences, Pennsylvania State University
  • Alec Broers FRS, Former President of the Royal Academy of Engineering
  • Harry Elderfield FRS, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Cambridge
  • Joanna Haigh FRS, Professor of Atmospheric Physics, Imperial College London
  • Isaac Held (NAS), NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory
  • John Kutzbach (NAS), Center for Climatic Research, University of Wisconsin
  • Jerry Meehl, Senior Scientist, National Center for Atmospheric Research
  • John Pendry FRS, Imperial College London
  • John Pyle FRS, Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge
  • Gavin Schmidt, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
  • Emily Shuckburgh, British Antarctic Survey
  • Gabrielle Walker, Journalist
  • Andrew Watson FRS, University of East Anglia

The Support for the 2014 Edition was provided by NAS Endowment Funds. We offer sincere thanks to the Ralph J. and Carol M. Cicerone Endowment for NAS Missions for supporting the production of this 2020 Edition.

F OR FURTHER READING

For more detailed discussion of the topics addressed in this document (including references to the underlying original research), see:

  • Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), 2019: Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate [ https://www.ipcc.ch/srocc ]
  • National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), 2019: Negative Emissions Technologies and Reliable Sequestration: A Research Agenda [ https://www.nap.edu/catalog/25259 ]
  • Royal Society, 2018: Greenhouse gas removal [ https://raeng.org.uk/greenhousegasremoval ]
  • U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP), 2018: Fourth National Climate Assessment Volume II: Impacts, Risks, and Adaptation in the United States [ https://nca2018.globalchange.gov ]
  • IPCC, 2018: Global Warming of 1.5°C [ https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15 ]
  • USGCRP, 2017: Fourth National Climate Assessment Volume I: Climate Science Special Reports [ https://science2017.globalchange.gov ]
  • NASEM, 2016: Attribution of Extreme Weather Events in the Context of Climate Change [ https://www.nap.edu/catalog/21852 ]
  • IPCC, 2013: Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) Working Group 1. Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis [ https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg1 ]
  • NRC, 2013: Abrupt Impacts of Climate Change: Anticipating Surprises [ https://www.nap.edu/catalog/18373 ]
  • NRC, 2011: Climate Stabilization Targets: Emissions, Concentrations, and Impacts Over Decades to Millennia [ https://www.nap.edu/catalog/12877 ]
  • Royal Society 2010: Climate Change: A Summary of the Science [ https://royalsociety.org/topics-policy/publications/2010/climate-change-summary-science ]
  • NRC, 2010: America’s Climate Choices: Advancing the Science of Climate Change [ https://www.nap.edu/catalog/12782 ]

Much of the original data underlying the scientific findings discussed here are available at:

  • https://data.ucar.edu/
  • https://climatedataguide.ucar.edu
  • https://iridl.ldeo.columbia.edu
  • https://ess-dive.lbl.gov/
  • https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/
  • https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/
  • http://scrippsco2.ucsd.edu
  • http://hahana.soest.hawaii.edu/hot/

Image

Climate change is one of the defining issues of our time. It is now more certain than ever, based on many lines of evidence, that humans are changing Earth's climate. The Royal Society and the US National Academy of Sciences, with their similar missions to promote the use of science to benefit society and to inform critical policy debates, produced the original Climate Change: Evidence and Causes in 2014. It was written and reviewed by a UK-US team of leading climate scientists. This new edition, prepared by the same author team, has been updated with the most recent climate data and scientific analyses, all of which reinforce our understanding of human-caused climate change.

Scientific information is a vital component for society to make informed decisions about how to reduce the magnitude of climate change and how to adapt to its impacts. This booklet serves as a key reference document for decision makers, policy makers, educators, and others seeking authoritative answers about the current state of climate-change science.

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COMMENTS

  1. 4 Conclusions and Recommendations

    Conclusions and Recommendations This report has explained the gaps in our knowledge of natural disaster losses and why these gaps should be filled. Poor knowledge of the resulting economic losses hinders implementation of effective disaster mitigation policies and emergency response programs.

  2. 4 Conclusions and Recommendations

    4 Conclusions and Recommendations The current "nonsystem" for providing information for disaster management is not effectively utilizing a wealth of information that resides with various organizations.

  3. Natural disasters and their impact: a methodological review

    Natural disasters generate profound socio-economic changes in the affected communities. A consistent methodology that allows quantifying its impacts is essential for the implementation of...

  4. The Economic Impacts of Natural Disasters: A Review of Models and

    Introduction. Since the 1990s, a series of natural disasters have caused economic losses in the tens of billions of U.S. dollars. Examples include the Northridge (United States) earthquake in 1994, the Kobe (Japan) earthquake in 1995, the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake that caused the Asian tsunami, Hurricane Katrina (United States) in 2005, the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, and ...

  5. 5 Conclusions

    Read chapter 5 Conclusions - Achieving Earthquake Resilience: The United States will certainly be subject to damaging earthquakes in the future. ... Resilience is also interpreted to encompass both pre- and post-disaster actions that, in combination, will enhance the robustness and the capabilities of all earthquake-vulnerable regions of our ...

  6. Chapter 5

    Recommendation 3. Integrate the needs of populations that are disproportionately vulnerable to disasters caused by natural hazards into DRR project targeting and design, implementation, and results reporting. This can be accomplished by strengthening collaboration between the GPs working on disaster activities with poverty and social ...

  7. Natural and Human-Made Disasters

    References. Every year, approximately 400 natural disasters occur worldwide. Added to these are 30-40 armed conflicts ( 1 ). Together, these and other emergencies imperil the health of hundreds of millions of people and substantially increase levels of morbidity and mortality. The future may bring more calamity to more places around the world ...

  8. Impact of Natural Disasters on Construction Projects: Strategies to

    ... The shift to remote work and limited access to resources slowed down the revision and approval processes for critical documents and the extended time required resulted in schedule overruns and...

  9. Conclusion

    311-312 Published: May 2013 Split View Annotate Cite Permissions Share Subject Economic Development and Growth Environmental Economics Collection: Oxford Scholarship Online The economic impact of natural disasters has been increasing in the last decade. Lives are lost and people are disabled, sometimes for life.

  10. Natural Disaster

    Abstract Natural disasters are the result of a hazard overwhelming highly vulnerable community, often resulting in mortality and morbidity. Over the past decade, over 300 natural disasters occur yearly around the world affecting millions and cost billions.

  11. How to Write a Conclusion on Disaster Management

    In the conclusion of your natural disasters article or plan, outline the potential disasters that your company may be at risk of facing. These may include natural disasters such as floods, forest fires, earthquakes and hurricanes. It may also include man-made disasters such as theft, arson, data loss, chemical leakages or terrorist threats.

  12. PDF The Impact of Natural Disasters on Human Development an Poverty at The

    For affected municipalities, the impact on the Human Development Index is similar to going back 2 years in human development over the same period analyzed on average. Natural disasters increase extreme (food) poverty by. 3.6 percentage points, capacities poverty by 3 percentage points, and assets poverty by.

  13. Displacement, Natural Disasters, and Human Rights

    In the course of the past year, over 400 natural disasters took 16,000 lives, affected close to 250 million people and displaced many millions. But many humanitarian actors continue to see natural ...

  14. Natural disasters and "One-Health"

    Back Thu, 21 Feb 2019 Presentations Natural disasters and "One-Health" - Conclusions Natural disasters, like floods, earthquakes or extreme climate outbreaks, severely challenge the health and welfare of people, animals and the ecosystem.

  15. Conclusion

    First Online: 25 June 2020 256 Accesses Part of the Water Science and Technology Library book series (WSTL,volume 94) Abstract Flood events have a very special place in the field of natural disasters, the frequency of which has been increasing over the last decades, and their consequences account for 31% of economic losses.

  16. Natural disaster

    natural disaster, any calamitous occurrence generated by the effects of natural, rather than human-driven, phenomena that produces great loss of human life or destruction of the natural environment, private property, or public infrastructure.

  17. Managing the Risk of Natural Disasters

    Managing the Risk of Natural Disasters (2022). We are facing a global climate crisis. Each year, the number of natural disasters and severe weather events — from devastating floods in Europe and Asia to deadly wildfires in North America — continues to increase. According to a 2020 report from the United Nations, there were 7,348 natural ...

  18. Beyond the Headlines: Five Observations on Natural Disasters

    Observation number 2: Poverty exacerbates a disaster's impact. Chances of surviving a natural disaster are much higher in developed countries than in developing ones. For example, in 1988, an ...

  19. Conclusion

    Conclusion All of the five natural disasters are dangerous in their own way. When searching for the most dangerous one, we especially looked at the amount of deaths, rather than the reparation costs. All natural disasters can differ from not very dangerous to very dangerous.

  20. Natural disaster

    Terminology A natural disaster is the highly harmful impact on a society or community following a natural hazard event. The term "disaster" itself is defined as follows: "Disasters are serious disruptions to the functioning of a community that exceed its capacity to cope using its own resources.

  21. Natural Disaster project .

    Natural Disaster project . DISASTER A sudden and terrible event in nature (such as a hurricane, tornado, or flood) that usually results in serious damage and many deaths. MAN-MADE DISASTER Man-made disasters are usually the result of things going wrong in our complex technological society.

  22. Natural Disasters Essay: 500+ Words Essay for Students in English

    Last updated on Dec 9, 2022 Download as PDF Natural Disasters Essay for Students in English The word disaster means great damage. A natural disaster is nothing but terrible damage caused by natural forces. Nature is the ultimate force and can never be controlled by any. When the rigour force rages on mankind, it is known as a natural disaster.

  23. Multi-hazard and Risk-informed System for Enhanced Local and ...

    MEDiate is a HORIZON Europe project with the main objective to contribute to improving disaster risk management and governance. The project is developing a decision-support system (DSS) for disaster risk management considering multiple interacting natural hazards and cascading impacts using a novel resilient-informed and service-oriented approach that accounts for forecasted modifications in ...

  24. Biden-Harris Administration Announces New Actions to Help Communities

    This grant funding is available after a presidentially declared disaster. FEMA funding net-zero projects will cut utility costs, increase energy reliability and reduce disaster-related costs for communities. Net-zero infrastructure and buildings are more resilient and can maintain comfort and safety in emergencies such as brown-outs, black-outs ...

  25. Conclusion

    C ONCLUSION. This document explains that there are well-understood physical mechanisms by which changes in the amounts of greenhouse gases cause climate changes. It discusses the evidence that the concentrations of these gases in the atmosphere have increased and are still increasing rapidly, that climate change is occurring, and that most of ...

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    In their latest mock draft, CBS Sports NFL Draft expert Chris Trapasso has Los Angeles moving down in the draft one spot to select Oregon State tackle Taliese Fuaga.

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    The Georgia election subversion case against Donald Trump and 14 of his allies took a stunning turn Thursday when two top prosecutors testified under oath about their romantic relationship at a ...

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