Perennial disaster patterns in Central Europe since 2000 and implications for hospital preparedness planning – a cross-sectional analysis
The goal of this analysis is to describe seasonal disaster patterns in Central Europe in order to raise awareness and improve hospital disaster planning and resilience, particularly during peak events. The authors conducted a cross-sectional analysis of the Emergency Events Database EM-DAT for disasters in Central Europe between January 2000 and December 2023. Time distribution of disasters, patterns and longitudinal trends, were analyzed to discuss impact on disaster preparedness in hospitals.
The findings show that out of 474 events, 83% were associated with a natural hazard and only 80 events (17%) were of technological cause. The paper also finds that extreme temperatures, floods, and storms cause over 90% of the disasters due to natural hazards in central Europe. An overlap of hospital admissions due to seasonal effects and catastrophic events, mainly triggered by disasters of natural cause in vulnerable periods may lead to a partial collapse of the health care system.
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