Volume 12, Issue 4

This piece is based on the keynote address I delivered at the 40th Annual Conference of the Hazards Center at the University of Colorado/Boulder in July (https://theswitch.co.uk/blog/environment/natural-hazards-center). My charge from the Hazards Center was to “provide your reflections on how our community (researchers and practitioners) has evolved over the last four decades” and “feel free to get personal and to talk about what the community has meant to you and your work.” Unlike the other keynote talks at that conference, and unlike the other articles in this journal, this is a personal history, based on my career experiences over the past 38 years. As such, it includes many candid comments on things that have gone well and things that have not over the past four decades.

During October 2014, the US experienced several cases of Ebola viral hemorrhagic fever (VHF). These occurrences arose from infected people entering the US including as well, physicians and nurses contracting the disease in the course of rendering medical care to the infected. The extent of the outbreak, as limited as it fortunately was, revealed problems in preparedness and the technical protocols followed in dealing with such a virulent disease pathogen. It may even serve as a warning that US policies and practices in dealing with hyper-infectious and seriously communicable disease have fallen short and require technically critical reassessment in how the US should or may need to respond to such incurable pathogens that enter the country, regardless if a natural or a terrorist mediated event. The issue of individual rights against quarantine also arises. This paper offers examination and suggestions for official responses to safeguard the health and rights of all.

The idea of border security is a notion that the US has pursued in earnest since September 11, 2001 and continues to be a focus for many Americans. This topic is assuredly going to rise once again as we near our 2016 national elections and the complex, often emotional issue, will take center stage as a heavily discoursed issue. Although there have been significant gains in how we enforce our international borders, there is wide disagreement on the success we have had with our border security efforts. Performance measures for border security are not always clear but there is a mosaic listing of outputs that suggest that border enforcement efforts have been successful. Unfortunately, we have failed to clearly delineate what successful border security efforts look like and before the nation, once again, makes a significant investment in resources we should start with the notion of defining successful border security.

This paper proposes a new direction for U.S. Government cyber policy focusing on stimulus that indirectly incites actions by others to improve cybersecurity protection. To date, the U.S. government has relied on two directions to establish a foundation for cyber security policy: legislative and informative. The former is realized as legislative laws or regulation that provide specific direction to companies or the general public. The latter involves the production and dissemination of information, which is realized in three forms: guidelines, response efforts, and testbeds/pilots. This paper proposes a new “carrot and stick approach” that incorporates both taxes and tax rebates to stimulate solutions that address problems without the government dictating a specific solution.

All regions of the US experience disasters which result in a number of negative public health consequences. Some populations have higher levels of social vulnerability and, thus, are more likely to experience negative impacts of disasters including emotional distress, loss of property, illness, and death. To mitigate the impact of disasters on at-risk populations, emergency managers must be aware of the social vulnerabilities within their community. This paper describes a qualitative study which aimed to understand how emergency managers identify social vulnerabilities, also referred to as at-risk populations, in their populations and barriers and facilitators to current approaches. Findings suggest that although public health tools have been developed to aid emergency managers in identifying at-risk populations, they are not being used consistently. Emergency managers requested more information on the availability of tools as well as guidance on how to increase ability to identify at-risk populations.

Objective: An effective response to a pandemic influenza assumes an adequate supply of a variety of skilled healthcare workers (HCWs). But what is known of HCWs’ willingness to report to work? Method: We identified 206 relevant studies from 9 healthcare databases. Of 28 heterogeneous studies that met inclusion criteria, 18 used common methods for calculating percentages of HCWs willing to report to work. Their findings were evaluated in greater depth. Results: In 28 studies that summarized willingness to report to work of 31,633 workers, the percentage of HCWs willing to report to work varied between 23.10% and 93.10%. Scale type and dichotomization of self-report scales led to significantly different results. In 4 studies where 2097 workers responded to a survey during an actual event (2009 H1N1 pandemic influenza) percentage willing to report to work varied from 23.1% to 90.1%. In 6 studies with hypothetical scenarios of avian influenza 50%–82.50% of HCWs were willing to report to work. Conclusion: The studies we reviewed have methodological problems and inconsistencies in findings, even within relatively homogenous study subgroups. We caution emergency planners from relying on findings from any single study that estimates HCWs’ mean willingness to report to work in a pandemic influenza outbreak.

The overall goal of this study was to examine any validity of emerging concerns about the effectiveness and usefulness of a single language public messaging system in a linguistically diverse environment by evaluating the level of understanding of Notify NYC messages among Korean LEP residents of New York City. Three task oriented objectives were completed to address the goal of this study: (1) using past Notify NYC messages, a survey to test comprehension levels among Korean LEP residents was created; (2) the survey was administered among two population samples, Korean LEP and native English speaking (NES); and (3) statistical analysis was employed to correlate the data, conduct testing of three hypotheses, and develop appropriate conclusions. The results demonstrate that primary challenges with effective use of a single-language system in providing emergency communication to LEP residents stem from the language barriers that exist for this population category in the US. The positive pattern correlation and high coefficient of determination imply that improving the clarity of the emergency messages could enhance the overall message comprehension among the LEP US residents.

This article examines data collected from a panel of 43 local, state, and Federal emergency response professionals and public officials in Pueblo, Colorado who participated in a 6-month risk communication experiment simulating the remediation of simultaneous bioterrorist attacks involving anthrax and Foot and Mouth Disease. Participant responses to the scenario presented in real-time indicated that local and state government agency personnel with responsibility for public health emergency management are not necessarily familiar with best practices developed from major incidents. Findings also indicate that information related to bioterrorism response should be provided to agencies that do not normally work in public health but that would be involved in responding to a biological agent event.

Based on a continuing program of research, this paper reveals several organizational measures needed if emotional labor is to be supported, including self-care plans, recruiting for self-awareness, and performance evaluations that capture more than a standard set of knowledge, skills, and abilities. The paper focuses on the experience of emergency responders, who work in extreme conditions that demand extensive emotional labor. Propositions are presented to link human resource management practices and individual and organizational outcomes; propositions that can inform future research and hypothesis testing in this area.

Purpose of the research is to examine coordination in disaster response by computer simulation using Petri net. We addressed issues on coordination in disaster response by focusing on interorganizational processes. Defining the processes according to disaster exercise, we developed the model based on Stochastic Petri Net. Index items, including average delay time and busyness probability, were introduced to facilitate discussion. Simulation demonstrated utilization of process analysis in performance assessment of collaborative disaster response. Since fragmentation is critical factor hindering efficient response, its remedy or elimination should be focused for system optimization.

The emergency aid station is one of the crucial components of the emergency health service chain providing vital acute medical care. This paper aims to solve a real world case related with the deployment of emergency aid stations in one of the densely populated districts of İstanbul/Turkey in order to determine the minimal number of ambulances needed to maintain complete coverage of all districts and also to obtain maximum population coverage with limited available ambulances. In this context, a new genetic algorithm capable of presenting quick and qualified solutions for a specific set and maximal covering location problems with limitations on service capacity of facilities is proposed.

Extensive research has found that there are differences in reported levels of fear of crime and associated protective actions influenced by socio-demographic characteristics such as race and gender. Further studies, the majority of which focused on violent and property crime, have found that specific demographic characteristics influence fear of crime and protective behaviors. However, little research has focused on the influence of socio-demographic characteristics on perceptions, and protective actions in response to the threat of terrorism. Using data from the General Social Survey, this study compared individual level protective actions and perceptions of the effectiveness of protective responses to the 9/11 terrorist attacks among Americans for demographic factors that have been found to influence fear of crime and protective actions. Results indicated that several socio-demographic factors including race and gender do exhibit some differences in perceptions of the effectiveness of responses to terrorism, although not all achieved statistical significance. Results are discussed in relation to their implications for criminological theory, security, and terrorism preparedness.

This paper aims to review what is known about the preparedness of hospital emergency departments (EDs) for a possible major earthquake expected in the near future in Istanbul and reveal the past experience and future plans from employees’ viewpoints and, as well as from the related literature. For this purpose, potential effects of the earthquakes on ED operations, patient flow, and performance are discussed considering the statistical data of recent earthquakes in Turkey, a comprehensive report on the disaster preparedness of Istanbul and, one to one interviews with the earthquake experienced ED medical staff. In particular, issues on patient surge, triage and registration, communication, patient flow and transportation and, lack of enough resources and space to treat are presented as the main challenges. According to the viewpoints obtained from various sources, EDs in Istanbul are not ready to meet the needs caused by a major earthquake. It is proposed that operational research (OR) techniques can be useful to overcome these issues such as simulation modeling.