Infection surveillance after a natural disaster: lessons learnt from the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011
Bulletin of the World Health Organization 2013;91:784-789. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.2471/BLT.13.117945:
This report presents the outcome of a project carried out with the aim to establish an efficient system of infection surveillance to cover all of the clinics in Rikuzen-Takata of Japan in the wake of the the Great East Japan Earthquake – using only the resources that were locally available: The project also aimed to maintain this system until most of the evacuation centres would be closed.
The project found that to protect the survivors of natural disasters from diseases the prompt establishment – or re-establishment – of a system of infection surveillance is essential. Infection surveillance is known to have played an important role in preventing outbreaks of communicable diseases following the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. After the Great East Japan Earthquake, primary medical care was rapidly provided by the development of several stand-alone clinics that were run by local and visiting teams of health personnel. The rigorous cooperation between support teams and the effective communication network – that, together, would allow the rapid redevelopment of an effective city-wide system of health care – took longer to develop.
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