รายละเอียดกระทู้

ZARINA PATEL http://www.brecorder.com/weekend-magazine/0/1247498/ Humanity has witnessed both natural and manmade disasters since the dawn of its existence. Many ancient civilisations, including, the Mohen jo Daro, the Eastern Roman Empire the Norse and the Old Egyptian Empire, were destroyed by the effects of natural disasters. It was floods, famines, earthquakes, tsunamis and plaque events, which completely wiped out many ancient human populations. Disaster is a catastrophic event that brings about great damage, destruction, and devastation to life and prosperity." Disaster management is the mechanism of co-ordinating and utilising available resources to deal emergencies effectively. An effective disaster management system can reduce and minimise the suffering of affected people. Cyclones, tsunami, floods, droughts, earthquakes, and volcanoes are a few examples of natural disasters, wars and nuclear attacks are fabricated disasters. To minimise the loss of lives, injuries, spread of diseases, damage to properties, destruction of assets, loss of services, social and economic disruption and environmental degradation caused by natural and manmade disasters. The General Assembly decided on 29 December 2009 to designate 13 October as the date to commemorate the "International Day for Disaster Reduction". The day gives awareness of how people are taking action to reduce their risk to disasters. It encourages every citizen to participate in building disaster resilient communities and nations. The theme of the 2013 International Day for Disaster Reduction (IDDR) was "Living with Disability and Disasters." There are between 2.9 and 4.2 million persons with disabilities among the world's 42 million forcibly displaced population. A person is disable if he has deafness, blindness and defects of vision, mental illness and retardation, cerebral damage, stroke, senility and dementia, Alzheimer's disease, and, numerous forms of dependence on personnel, equipment and supplies for support to the vital functions that sustain life. The results of the first-ever UN global survey of persons living with disabilities on how they cope with disasters, illustrates why they die, or are injured, in disproportionate numbers in disasters. Natural and manmade disasters have profound physical, mental, and social impacts on people with disabilities. According to data from the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) Individuals with disabilities are greatly affected by disasters. They need assistance, volunteers, and helpers to save their lives during and after disasters. It is difficult for people visual or hearing impairments to notice warning signals and recognise quick evacuation routes during a disaster situation. Subsequently there should be a separate alarm system along with personnel support to move them to a safer place. More than often, relief activities during emergencies and disasters ignore them. While, common experience reveals that persons with disabilities are more likely to be left behind or abandoned during evacuation in disasters and conflicts due to a lack of preparation and planning. A study shows that most shelters and refugee camps are not accessible and people with disabilities are many times even turned away from shelters and refugees camps due to a perception that they need "complex medical" services. Disruption to physical, social, economic, and environmental networks and support systems affect persons with disabilities much more than the general population. It is responsibility of every citizen to help person with disability in appropriate manners. It is important to provide relevant information in a manner, which they can understand such as using simple language or pictures, or speaking very slowly and clearly. Disaster Management System in Pakistan Internal conflicts and natural calamities such as the earthquake 2005, Hunza landslides and flood 2010 have made Pakistan one of the most disaster prone countries in the world. The worst ever flood of 2010 had adversely impacted every sphere of people's lives ranging from the loss of their dear ones, livestock, cultivated land, crops to stored grains, etc. An area of about 160,000 square kilometres (almost one-third of the country) covered with floodwater, damaged the infrastructure and agriculture more severely in Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa, Punjab and Sind provinces. Moreover, it had displaced about 20 million people. On September 24, 2013 jolted north - north-east of Awaran in the province of Balochistan. The earthquake was a magnitude 7.7 caused the death of at least 825 people and injured hundreds more. On 28 September, another earthquake with a 6.8 magnitude hit Pakistan at a depth of 14.8 km, killed at least 22 people. Impact of any calamity is much adverse if it strikes suddenly. However, if there is awareness and preparedness, its impact much reduced. Unfortunately, lack of disaster preparedness, knowledge of risk factors, policies and procedures to face natural calamities has aggravated the situation. A writer argued, "In Pakistan there is no sufficient understanding and risk reduction strategy. There is no standard procedure for institutionalised identification and assessment of geographical locations, which are vulnerable to various disasters. Geologists warn that the occurrence of a disaster of lesser magnitude could simply erase our coastal areas from the map. The Indian Ocean doesn't have a single tsunamograph to receive accurate data on any approaching tsunami. Tide gauges installed in Pakistan are not effective enough to issue timely warnings. The time lag between receiving a warning and evacuation could be fatally small and result in disastrous ramifications. Pakistan's coast has hardly any scientifically developed tsunami evacuation plans in the public knowledge. Karachi, the largest city, located on the coast and the present infrastructure and land-use pattern may trigger a disaster of immense proportions. There are four major faults around Karachi and along the southern coast of Makran. An earthquake of 8.0 magnitude on Richter scale can generate big devastation. It is very important to create awareness, at all level of society; national, provincial and district level about the natural signs of disaster. There is immense need to built safe escape routes, to motivate youth for volunteer work in case of disaster and train public how to manage disasters.