New Books on Disasters

Handling Dead Bodies
Management of Dead Bodies after Disasters: A Field Manual for First Responders offers step-bystep guidance on how to recover and identify victims killed in disasters, while respecting the needs and rights of survivors. Starting from the premise that dead bodies are not a serious health threat following disasters, it advocates proper identification of victims and avoidance of mass burials and cremations.

The book is aimed at members of local organizations and communities, who are generally called upon to respond in the immediate aftermath of disasters, rather than specialized teams of national and international experts, who tend to arrive later.The manual uses plain language and provides practical information and guidance on how to recover bodies, how to store them, methods for identification, long-term storage and disposal, communications and the media, and support to families and relatives. The book also provides practical annexes, including a dead body identification form, a missing persons form, and a chart of sequential numbers for unique referencing of bodies.

The manual was developed jointly by PAHO/WHO, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

Safe Hospitals in Floods
Hospitales seguros ante inundaciones ("Safe Hospitals in Floods," available only in Spanish) provides guidelines on how to make hospitals less vulnerable to the most common form of natural disaster. The book details the costs, both human and economic, of hospitals and health facilities being vulnerable to floods, provides methods for evaluating that vulnerability, and offers technical recommendations for prevention and mitigation measures as well as for rehabilitation and reconstruction of health infrastructure.

The book is aimed at both technical and managerial personnel in the public sector, including national and local government officials, hospital administrators and directors, health authorities, engineers and architects, operations and maintenance experts, and other staff involved in health infrastructure.

Reducing Risks in Water, Sanitation
The Challenge in Disaster Reduction for the Water and Sanitation Sector is a joint publication of PAHO, UNICEF, International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.The book explains the importance of keeping water and sanitation services functional following disasters. It says the vulnerability of these essential services to interruption during disasters has increased as a result of population growth, rapid urbanization, and environmental degradation as well as decentralization and privatization. In most countries, water and sanitation companies, both private and public, are exempted from responsibility for providing their services during emergencies.

The book proposes minimum standards for continuity of water and sanitation services and urges that providers be held responsible, through regulation or contractual obligations, for maintaining these services during emergencies and disasters.The book notes that it is more cost-effective to incorporate mitigation measures during construction of new systems than to install them in existing systems. However, protecting existing systems is also important, especially in areas that are exposed to hazards.

The book is intended to help developing countries meet the Millennium Development Goal of reducing by half the proportion of people without sustainable access to drinking water and basic sanitation by 2015.

These and other PAHO materials on disaster mitigation are available at PAHO's Disaster Pages.