Public Health Humanitarian Responses to Natural Disasters

Front matter

ae a

Public Health

= ”

Contents

List of illustrations ix List of boxes xii List of contributors xvii Foreword by Professor Joseph J. Y. Sung xxiii Foreword by Professor Andrew Hamilton XXV Foreword by Professor Virginia Murray xxvi Acknowledgements xxviii List of abbreviations XXX

Introduction 1

1 Key public health concepts of disaster preparedness and response 3 2 Disaster concepts and trends 27 3 General public health impacts of natural disasters 61 4 The specific human health impacts of natural disasters 81

Index

ILLUSTRATIONS

Figures

Three domains of public health

An iceberg of health outcomes

Determinants of health

Social advantages and health across lifetimes and generations Pathway of care

Hierarchy of prevention pyramid

Five phases of disaster

Classification of disasters

An example of categorising technological disasters

The nuclear power plant at Chernobyl in Ukraine Mindanao armed conflict

Fragile state: Afghanistan — Kabul in April 2004

Sidoarjo mudflow in Indonesia

Natural disaster trends by disaster type (2014)

Risk formula

Landscape of Bhutan

Disaster Risk Index (DRI)

The economic and human impact of disasters 2005—2014 Emergency threshold

Measuring health impact

Four tiers of health care

Medical humanitarian response after 2010 Haiti earthquake The correlation of environmental causes and consequences of disasters Water and sanitation

Shelter x Illustrations

3.10 4.1 4.2

4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6

5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6

5.7

5.8 6.1 6.2

6.3 6.4

Health services

Logistics

Biopsychosocial model of mental disorder

Absolute economic impact and mortality rate of disasters from high- to low-income countries

Relative economic impact and mortality rate of disasters from high- to low-income countries

The aftermath of the Great East Japan earthquake

Global seismic hazard map

Survival rates (%) of extricated people by rescue time after Tangshan earthquake in 1976

A victim of crush injury

Ring of Fire

The aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines Contribution of components to 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005 and 2014 Global Hunger Index Scores, by region

Minimum standards for health services

Water treatment using chlorine tablet

A typical simple pit latrine design in a school in Kenya

School children in Nepal

Food aid distribution

A temporary shelter funded by DFID in Malawi after an earthquake in 2010

Two hundred rolls of heavy-duty plastic sheeting being provided to earthquake-affected households in Nepal’s Kathmandu District’s Sankhu village and surrounding areas on 1 May 2015 by USAID

Using plastic sheeting for family emergency shelter Post-disaster mental impact over time

Four-layer pyramid of needs for mental health and psychosocial support in emergencies

Occupy Central

A dead body in a school parking area after New Orleans was truck by the Hurricane Katrina disaster in 2005

The global trend of ageing population from 1950 to 2050 Cluster approach: 11 clusters and their corresponding leading agencies The 2009 earthquake on Sumatra

Aftermath of the 2009 West Sumatra earthquake in Indonesia Flooding in Venice

Observed and projected annual mean sea level in Hong Kong Asia’s largest slum: Dharavi slum in Mumbai of India

Relief aid in the wake of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami Percentage of respondents giving a correct answer to each question in the knowledge-attitude-practice (KAP) survey

69 70 72

75 77 84

85 86 88 93

107 124 127 128 129 132

137 137 157

161 164

Illustrations xi

8.1 Functional areas of resilience 209 8.2 Awareness and practice of environmentally friendly

behaviours with health co-benefits in Hong Kong 211 8.3 Visited sites of CCOUC Ethnic Minority Health Project 216 8.4 Disaster preparedness kit 218 8.5A The three temporal phases of human security 235 8.5B The public health disaster cycle 236 8.6 Human security-aligned public health disaster cycle 236 Tables 2.1 Myths and facts about disasters 31 2.2 Comparison of some definitions of fragile states 41 2.3 Mortality thresholds commonly used to define emergency situations 55 3.1. Common health indicators for quantifying health impacts of disasters 63 3.2 Infrastructure damage in the 2010 Haiti earthquake 66 3.3 Some potential environmental impact of disaster on population 69 4.1 The modified Mercalli scale versus the Richter scale 82 4.2 Scales for measuring the intensity of cyclones in various oceanic

basins 91 4.3 Direct and indirect health impact of flooding 99 4.4 Types of drought 102 5.1 Burden of chronic diseases in selected disaster-prone countries 138 6.1 Typical profile of injuries in earthquakes in descending order of

proportion 150 6.2 The relationship between natural disasters and chronic diseases 153 6.3 Reasons why different responders often neglect chronic diseases

after a disaster 155 6.4 Mental health impact and types of disaster 159 6.5 The Interagency Emergency Health Kit 159 7.1 Key stakeholders in international disaster response 183

8.1 Comparison of “human security” characteristics and public

health principles 234 8.2 Post-disaster chronic disease interventions suggested by the

convergence of the human security approach and the public

health disaster cycle 237 8.3 HFA’s five priorities in building the resilience of nations and

communities to disasters 238

BOXES

Case boxes 1.1 Tsunami warning and mitigation for the Indian Ocean region 1.2 School-in-a-box by UNICEF 1.3 How does disaster epidemiology benefit a disaster-affected population? 1.4 The Dutch famine tragedy 2.1 1986 Chernobyl accident, former Soviet Union 2.2 2015 industrial accident in Tianjin, China 2.3 Mindanao armed conflict, the Philippines 2.4 The Sidoarjo mudflow incident in Indonesia (by Levina Chandra Khoe and Emily Ying Yang Chan) 2.5 What makes low-income countries particularly vulnerable to disasters? 2.6 Glacial lake outburst floods in Bhutan (by Rinzin Jamtsho) 2.7 The horror of the Great Kant6 earthquake 1923 (Part 1): secondary disasters 3.1 2008 Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar 3.2 The 2010 Haiti earthquake 3.3 Challenges of consecutive floods and droughts in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) (by Mayling Chan) 3.4 Economic impact of disasters in high- and low-income countries 3.5 The great East Japan earthquake in 2011 (by Carman Mark and Makiko Kato MacDermot) 4.1 The 1976 Tangshan earthquake: timeliness of extrication and survival 4.2 Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines 4.3 Floods and landslides in Brunei in the past decade

(by Chi Shing Wong)

oun fs

19 35 37 38

46 49

57 63 65

70 74

76 85 92

4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 4.8

4.9 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5

5.6 527

5.8 5.9

6.1 6.2 6.3

6.4

6.5

7.1

Floods in Peru and Chile, March 2015 (by Chi Shing Wong) Eastern Horn of Africa drought crisis 2010—2011

Indian famine code

Cold waves in a subtropical city, Hong Kong 2008 Temperature-mortality versus temperature-morbidity threshold in an urban Asian city

Controlling the emergence of new infectious diseases: severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) 2002—2003

Implications of the damage to water supplies in the 1995 Great Hanshin-Awaji earthquake

School-led total sanitation (SLTS) in Nepal

Nutritional issues of the Wenchuan earthquake, 2008 Chronic disease care post-disaster in Asia

Mobilisation of existing resources: Nutritional Rehabilitation Home, Sunakothi, Lalitpur, Nepal (by Carol Ka Po Wong) Haiti earthquake 2010

The use of information for cholera outbreak control after the Haiti earthquake

The horror of the Great Kant6 earthquake 1923 (Part 2) Communication during the 2011 great floods in Thailand (by Cecilia Choi)

The 2008 Sichuan earthquake

Why are chronic non-communicable diseases forgotten?

An example of how to upgrade an emergency medical kit to cater to “non-life-threatening” health needs

Psychological support as one of the pillars in the control of the West Africa Ebola virus disease outbreak (by Eliza Cheung with Hong Kong Red Cross)

Pre-disaster psychological first aid training among responders in a vessel collision accident on National Day in Hong Kong (by Eliza Cheung and Emily Ying Yang Chan)

Psychological support service amid political protests

(by Eliza Cheung with Hong Kong Red Cross)

Tsunami marriage in Islamic Indonesia (by Christy Chan)

The health impact of recurrent floods on children in Bangladesh

Child soldier

After the 2005 Pakistani Kashmir earthquake: the forgotten health needs of the elderly

Child-friendly space: an intergenerational approach

(by Christy Chan)

Disaster preparedness plan needed for maternal care,

Nepal earthquake 2015 (by Eva Chor-chiu Lam)

Boxes

The 2009 West Sumatra earthquake in Indonesia (by Cecilia Choi)

xiii

101 103 104 109

110 112 126 129 134 138

140 141

142 142

143 154 155

174 186

8.3

8.5

8.6

8.7

8.8

8.9

8.10

8.11

8.12

8.13

Boxes

Health outcomes of the internally displaced persons (IDPs) after the 2005 Pakistani Kashmir earthquake

Will Hong Kong sink under the sea?

Sea level rise in Bangladesh

The 2010 flooding in Hainan Island, China (by Crystal Yingjia Chu)

Relief aid effectiveness in Aceh, Indonesia, after the 2004 tsunami How public-private partnerships between telecommunications

and humanitarian agencies can save lives

Taiwan’s deadly Typhoon Morakot: the inadequate disaster preparedness, management, communications and culturally sensitive response (by Chi Shing Wong)

The cost of Ebola

Public health findings from the 2013 Typhoon Haiyan in

the Philippines

Do people with previous disaster experience have better preparedness than people without any previous disaster experience?

Mitigation strategy: health co-benefits of combining environmentally friendly measures and health risk issues

Bottom-up resilience: coordination of millions of volunteers in disaster response in China

Preparedness in urban settings: Hong Kong

Preparedness in rural settings: the Ethnic Minority Health Project in China

Impact of disaster preparedness intervention in Yi minority community in Sichuan Province, China (by Poyi Lee and

Emily Ying Yang Chan)

Collaborative training of community mental health workers

(by Elizabeth A. Newnham)

Community participation ensuring disaster risk management, livelihood and food security of the communities in Laos

(by Provash Mondal)

Hong Kong Jockey Club Disaster Preparedness and Response Institute (HK JCDPRI) as an example of a coordinated professional effort to address disaster preparedness at the community level (by Donald KT Li and Kevin KC Hung)

How different Miyagi schools fared in the face of the Great East Japan earthquake triple disaster in 2011 (by Makiko Kato MacDermot)

The 2003 Bam earthquake, Iran

The 2010 Great Fire of Bumthang in the Kingdom of Bhutan (by Rinzin Jamtsho)

Disaster-resilient communities: prepared to cope with disasters in Vietnam (by Provash Mondal)

Disaster risk reduction by EWS in Cuba

213 215

225 226

Boxes xv

8.14 Temperature warning in urban community: the case of temperature warning in an urban Chinese city

(by Janice Ying-En Ho and Emily Ying Yang Chan) 227 8.15 A community-based initiative to enhance early warning of

flash floods in Iran (by Ali Ardalan) 228 8.16 An example of global online training 229 8.17 The comprehensive Safe Hospital Framework (by Carman Mark) 231

8.18 What’s next? Bottom-up resilience and disaster health risk reduction after the dual earthquakes in Nepal in 2015 (by Emily Ying Yang Chan, Carman Mark,

Carol Ka Po Wong and Gloria Kwong Wai Chan) 233 8.19 Human security approach to post-disaster chronic disease needs 235 8.20 HFA and resilience building 238

8.21 An example of how “health” might be integrated into international policy frameworks: the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030, Bangkok Principles (March 2016) and New Delhi Declaration (November 2016) (by Sharon Tsoon Ting Lo, Gloria Kwong Wai Chan and Emily Ying Yang Chan) 239

Knowledge boxes

1.1. Primary prevention in communicable diseases 19 2.1 Fragile state: complex emergencies 40 2.2 Mega-disasters 45 2.3 World atlas of natural disaster risk 52 2.4 What can be other measures for emergency threshold? 56 4.1 The modified Mercalli scale and Richter scale 82 4.2 Crush injury and crush syndrome 86 4.3 Tsunami 87 4.4 The Ring of Fire 88 4.5 Landslides 95 4.6 Global Hunger Index 107 5.1 The Sphere Project 120 5.2 Some key standards for supporting basic requirements of

health post-disaster 121 5.3 Facts and trends of health problems related to water and sanitation 125 5.4 Facts and trends of nutrition 132 5.5 Plastic sheeting as emergency shelter 136 6.1 Typical injuries in earthquakes 150 6.2 Steps to infectious disease control 151 6.3 Should communicable diseases always be managed as acute diseases? 152 6.4 Global pattern of mental health problems 157 6.5 Dead body management 166

6.6 Children in disasters 167 xvi

6.7 6.8 6.9 7.1 7.2 7.3

7.4 7.5 8.1 8.2

Boxes

Facts and trends of older people in the twenty-first century Facts and trends of women in disasters

World Health Organization guidelines and fact sheets in disaster Key disaster response agencies

Facts and trends

Facts and trends of populations living in poverty/ resource-deficit settings

Facts and trends: disaster response in urban versus rural settings A sample programme planning tool

Literacy and disaster health risk literacy

An example of a disaster preparedness kit and the five basic survival needs in the rural community

170 173 175 183 189

194 194 201 214

CONTRIBUTORS

Author

Emily Ying Yang Chan, MBBS (HKU), BS (Johns Hopkins), SM PIH (Harvard), MD (CUHK), DFM (HKCFP), FFPH, FHKAM (Community Medicine), FHKCCM, is a professor and assistant dean at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) Faculty of Medicine and visiting professor of public health medicine at the Oxford University Nuffield Department of Medicine. She is also associate director at CUHK JC School of Public Health and Primary Care, centre director at the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC), director at CUHK Centre for Global Health, visiting scholar at the Harvard University FXB Center, senior fellow at Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, fellow at Hong Kong Academy of Medicine, member of The Asia Science Technology and Academia Advisory Group of the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR ASTAAG) and co-chairperson of World Health Organization Thematic Platform for Health Emergency & Disaster Risk Management Research Group. She received academic training at Johns Hopkins University, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, University of Hong Kong, CUHK and London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Her research interests include disaster and humanitarian medicine, health needs and programme impact evaluation of evidence-based medical and public health interventions in resource-deficit settings, climate change and health, global health, and violence and injury epidemiology. She also has rich medical and public health frontline experience and won a myriad of awards. Mostly recently, she was recognised as National Geographic Chinese Explorer for her frontier works.

Case contributors

Ali Ardalan, MD, PhD, is a pioneer in disaster risk management in Iran and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region who was the driving force behind xviii Contributors the creation of MPH and PhD training programmes in disaster health studies. He is an associate professor and director of Disaster and Emergency Health at Tehran University of Medical Sciences, an adviser to the deputy minister of health and director of the Disaster Risk Management Office at I. R. Iran Ministry of Health and Medical Education. Dr Ardalan is a member of WHO/EMR Health Emergency Advisory Group and a member of the UNISDR Asia Science, Technology and Academic Advisory Group (ASTAAG). Dr Ardalan serves WHO/EMR as a consultant and collaborates with WHO/Geneva on advocacy of “disaster risk reduction for health” and “hospitals safe from disasters” in line with SFDRR and the Bangkok Principles on implementation of health aspects of SFDRR. Dr Ardalan is the representative of Central Asia region in the International Board of Global Network of Disaster Reduction (GNDR). He was a nominee for the 2015 UN Sasakawa Award. Since 2012, he has been a visiting scientist at Department of Global Health and Population at Harvard School of Public Health, and a senior fellow at Harvard Humanitarian Initiative. Dr Ardalan is author and co-author of over 70 articles in English and Persian peer-reviewed journals and contributed to the 2009 UNISDR Global Assessment Report and 2013 IFRC World Disasters Report. He was a guest researcher at the Karolinska Institute, and remains an active contributor to the Disaster Supercourse based in Pittsburgh University.

Christy Oi Yan Jing Catrina Chan, BA (Psyc. Biol.), MPH, was a research assistant at the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC). She obtained a dual degree in Psychology and Biology at the College of St. Benedict and St. John’s University, USA, where she worked as a health advocate and peer educator, promoting physical, mental and social wellbeing among the college population. She has participated in overseas service projects and research-based missions in Tanzania and rural China.

Gloria Kwong Wai Chan, BSSc (CUHK), MSSc (CUHK) is a professional journalist by training. After spending years in political news reporting in Hong Kong, she joined the international medical humanitarian organisation Médecins Sans Frontières as the Director of Communications for the organisation’s communication effort in Hong Kong, China and Southeast Asia. Her expertise was employed in the frontline of a number of emergencies over the world. Before joining the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC), she was the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Medical Association. Ms Chan is currently a Board Member of Médecins Sans Frontières Hong Kong and serves as Assistant Director of CCOUC.

Mayling Chan, PhD, was raised in Hong Kong and received her higher education in the UK and Cuba. Her thematic expertise includes food security and national policy for both rural and urban sectors; sustainable systems of food production and livelihood, including sustainable management of natural resources and adaptation and mitigation of impacts of climate change. Her latest publications include Unfinished Puzzle, Cuban Agriculture: The Challenges, Lessons and Opportunities (Food First, USA, March 2013)

Contributors xix and tr EK (Rural Reforms in Cuba) (China, June 2013). She had held various management positions with international non-governmental organisations and she is currently the international programme director at Oxfam Hong Kong.

Eliza Cheung, MSSc in Clin. Psy., Reg. Psychol (Clin. Psych), PhD, specialises in disaster mental health and psychological first aid for her clinical practice, field work and research. She completed her professional training in clinical psychology and obtained her doctor of philosophy degree in public health at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Dr Cheung currently serves as a clinical psychologist at Hong Kong Red Cross, and is a master trainer and roster member of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). She has thus far trained over 2,000 disaster first responders and trainers in psychological first aid and psychosocial support from all over the world, including those from the Auxiliary Medical Service, Civil Aviation Department and Department of Health of the Hong Kong SAR government. In 2014 and 2015, she served as an IFRC psychosocial delegate in Liberia during the Ebola virus outbreak and in Nepal after the earthquake. She also worked with the World Health Organization in the review, translation and adaptation of some leading psychosocial support guidelines in emergency, including Psychological First Aid: Guide for Field Workers and Psychological First Aid during Ebola Virus Disease Outbreaks.

Cecilia YS Choi, MBBS (Sydney), MPH (CUHK), BSc (CUHK), was a graduate fellow at the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC) in 2011-12. She has worked on the CCOUC disaster case study series.

Janice Ying-En Ho is a PhD student in the School of Public Health and Primary Care at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. She is interested in the interactions between climate change, environment and health. A graduate from the University of Michigan with a degree in environmental sciences and psychology, she previously worked at the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC) as a research project officer.

Kevin KC Hung, MBChB, MRCSEd, MPH, EMDM, FHKCEM, FHKAM(EM), FRCEM, is an assistant professor in emergency medicine at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Dr Hung is an emergency medicine specialist with vast experience in conducting rural health needs assessment in the Asia-Pacific region with various NGOs and humanitarian initiatives. He was the founding executive director of Hong Kong Jockey Club Disaster Preparedness and Response Institute (HKJCDPRI). Dr Hung is also a Hong Kong Red Cross volunteer and had served as a community health delegate of Japanese Red Cross Society Basic Health Care Emergency Response Unit.

Rinzin Jamtsho was Head Deputy Secretary at the Public Grievance Redressal Office and a Political Secretary at the Prime Minister’s Office in the Kingdom of Bhutan (2008-2013). He was a Regional Fellow of the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response xx Contributors

(CCOUC) from April to August 2012 and completed a project on glacier lake outburst flood disaster mitigation.

Levina Chandra Khoe, MD, MPH, is currently teaching at the Department of Community Medicine, Universitas Indonesia. She received her Master in Public Health at The Chinese University of Hong Kong, focusing on public health disaster. She was also a CCOUC regional fellow (2013-2014), working on CCOUC disaster case study series. Before joining the university, she has been working with the Indonesian Ministry of Health on projects related to the implementation of Universal Health Care. She is also working as clinician and researcher, mainly in community health, public health in natural disasters, migrant health, health economics and policy.

Eva Chor-chiu Lam, BPharm, RPh, MPH, is a registered pharmacist and holds a master’s degree in public health, specialising in the global health sector. She is currently director of the Hong Kong Jockey Club Disaster Preparedness and Response Institute (HKJCDPRI). Over the eight years before she joined HKJCDPRI, she worked for Hong Kong Red Cross, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and has been involved in the frontline coordination or fieldwork of various emergencies in China, Nepal, Pakistan, Haiti, West Africa, Vietnam, Japan and so forth.

Poyi Lee, RN, MPH, completed her professional training in nursing and obtained her Master of Public Health degree in Hong Kong. She worked as a clinical nurse before joining the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC) in 2011. Ms Lee served as a Project Manager at CCOUC until 2015, and was mainly responsible for coordinating research and teaching activities. Her research interests include climate change and health, disaster and humanitarian medicine, health needs assessment, public health interventions and programme evaluation in resource deficit settings.

Donald KT Li, SBS, OStJ, JP, MBBS, FHKCFP, FRACGP, FHKAM, FHKDS, FFPH, FAFPM, FACP, FRCPT, FAMS, is a specialist in family medicine and president-elect of World Organization of Family Doctors (WONCA). Dr Li is also immediate past president of the Hong Kong Academy of Medicine and censor of the Hong Kong College of Family Physicians. Dr Li is the chairman of the HK JDPRI Governing Board. Dr Li graduated with his first degree (BA) in 1975 from Cornell University, USA, and second degree (MBBS) in 1980 from the University of Hong Kong. He is an honorary fellow of the Hong Kong College of Family Physicians, fellow of the Hong Kong Academy of Medicine, honorary fellow of the Hong Kong College of Dental Surgeons, honorary fellow of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, fellow of the Faculty of Public Health, honorary fellow of the Academy of Family Physicians of Malaysia, honorary fellow of the Academy of American College of Physicians, honorary fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Thailand and fellow of the Academy of Medicine, Singapore. He is a registered medical practitioner in mainland China.

Contributors xxi

Sharon Tsoon Ting Lo, MA (University of St Andrews, Scotland), is a Project Officer at the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC), where she coordinates their engagement with various UN-related international platforms pertaining to health and disaster risk reduction, and at the CUHK Centre for Global Health where she supports the Centre’s operation and activities, particularly through the CGH Sustainable Development Goals Series. She is also a Regional Focal Point at the UN Major Group for Children and Youth (UN MGCY), coordinating youth engagement in various UN processes under the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. She founded Youth Empact, an ethnic minority youth empowerment platform, under the Clinton Global University Initiative in January 2016. She won the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK Outstanding Disaster Project Award in 2016.

Anne Yan-yan Lung, BA, graduated from the Faculty of Arts at the University of Hong Kong. She joined Médecins Sans Frontiéres (MSF) in 1997 and specialises in research and advocacy. She is currently the manager of programme development of the Operational Support Unit of MSF in Hong Kong.

Makiko Kato MacDermot, RN, MSc (LSHTM), DLSHTM, completed a BSc Psychology (Hons) at Middlesex University and subsequently gained an MSc Global Health Policy at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine to further her career in the field of global health. She is also a registered nurse in Japan and the UK, as a senior intensive care nurse. She joined the JC School of Public Health and Primary Care as a research fellow in 2014 and was involved in various research activities. Her areas of interests are health system strengthening, disaster risk reduction for health, urban city planning, and climate change and health.

Carman Ka Man Mark, BSc (University of Essex), MPH (CUHK), obtained her bachelor's degree in Health Studies at the University of Essex in UK and received her Master of Public Health from The Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2014, majoring in Population and Global Health. She won the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK Outstanding Disaster Project Award in 2014. Carman is now a Graduate Fellow at the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC).

Provash Mondal, MA, PhD, holds BA in economics, BA in law, MA in economics specialising in rural development, and PhD in disaster management. Dr Mondal works as a humanitarian coordinator for Oxfam in Laos. He specialises in project and programme cycle management, managing emergency preparedness and developing contingency plans, emergency relief and rehabilitation, disaster risk reduction, climate change adaptation, livelihoods and Watsan projects. He joined Oxfam in 2000, and has worked in Bangladesh, India, the Philippines, Viet Nam and Laos. Dr Mondal worked initially with GUP, a national NGO in Bangladesh, and Action- Aid UK, MSF-Holland, EU and Bangladesh government bilateral projects.

xxii Contributors

Elizabeth Newnham, MPsych, PhD (W.Aust.), is a research fellow at the University of Western Australia, and research associate at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Dr Newnham has published broadly in the fields of trauma, global mental health and humanitarian emergencies, and is the recipient of a number of research grants and awards, including a National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia Early Career Fellowship. Dr Newnham conducted her postdoctoral training at Harvard University and the University of Oxford, held a CCOUC regional fellowship at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and has acted as a consultant to the World Bank.

Satoko Otsu, MD, MPH, DTMH Team leader of Japanese Red Cross Society Basic Health Care Emergency Response Unit, is the director of the Infectious Disease Department and assistant director of the International Medical Relief Department, Japanese Red Cross Society. Dr Otsu was involved in the Red Cross medical relief Operations since 2001 and deployed to more than 15 missions, including Afghan refugees in Pakistan and Indonesia tsunami operations. In addition, she has worked for WHO since 2007 and just returned from Vietnam as the team leader for Emerging Disease Surveillance and Response Unit.

Carol Ka Po Wong, BSSc (CUHK), MIPA (HKU), is a journalist by training and has acquired a Master's Degree in International and Public Affairs. She has years of project management experience in NGOs in Hong Kong and overseas, with a focus on public health and disaster managements. Before joining the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC), Ms Wong was stationed in the Philippines for more than two years, where her work in the field particularly focused on slum health, disaster preparedness and health in resource deficit settings.

Chi Shing Wong, MSc (LSE), has a background in journalism and communication. He received his master’s in comparative politics at the London School of Economics and Political Science, focusing on democratisation, ethnic politics and nationalism, with regional foci in China and Southeast Asia, and researched on political identity at the University of Oxford afterwards. Mr Wong has worked in various teaching, research and administrative positions in universities. Working at the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC), he is also the copy editor of this book.

Crystal Yingjia Zhu, MPH, received her bachelor’s degree in Biomedical Engineering from Zhejiang University of China. She worked at the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC) from 2011-2015 as a project officer, focusing on rural projects in China to promote disaster preparedness and key health messages. She has conducted research about rural health, climate change and waste management.

Foreword

By Professor Joseph J. Y. Sung

From the South-East Asian earthquake and tsunami in 2004, Sichuan earthquake in 2008 and Sendai tsunami in 2011 to the recent earthquake in Nepal in 2015, there is no shortage of major natural disasters in Asia. Professor Emily Chan has often reminded both clinical and non-clinical colleagues that natural disasters of various kinds are increasing in frequency and intensity with the dynamics of climate change, and making sense of how they can be responded to cost-effectively by employing public health principles is as important and as urgent a medical response to the post-disaster humanitarian crises as clinical treatment of disaster victims.

As the world leaders reached a global agreement on climate change at the Paris Climate Conference by the end of 2015, health has been brought into the centre of the respective agendas of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030, endorsed in the United Nations Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction earlier in March, and the new global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted at the United Nations in September of that year. The publication of this book is very timely to take stock of the public health principles relevant for responses to natural disasters, in particular those exacerbated by climate change, and the implications of these responses for development.

Professor Chan is to be congratulated for coming up with this very useful collection of the knowledge and experience she has acquired and accumulated in her years of teaching, research, knowledge transfer and consultancy activities locally, nationally, regionally and internationally, with the strong support of the Collaborating Centre for Oxford University and CUHK for Disaster and Medical Humanitarian Response (CCOUC). As a staunch believer and supporter of the Centre on both academic and humanitarian fronts, I am very glad that this collaboration between the two universities has been fruitful in moving forward this worthy discipline of disaster and medical humanitarian response, particularly in mainland China and the wider Asian region. It is also a reiteration of CUHK’s aspiration of xxiv Foreword promoting humanistic values through cooperating and exchanging with worldrenowned academic institutions.