Disaster risk literacy

Disaster risk literacy

Addressing the Needs of Subpopulations

Disaster risk management (DRM) involves various policies, interventions and activities to reduce vulnerability and to increase resilience and capacity.

One of the measures to mitigate public health impacts of health emergencies includes health promotion and health education in DRM. Health education is a widely used risk communication approach to increase knowledge and understanding of disaster risk. This helps to enable people at risk to make informed decisions about mitigating the effects of a hazard, e.g. flooding, and take protective and preventive actions independently.

The Health EDRM expert meeting in 2018 highlighted the importance of disaster risk literacy to raise public awareness of the health risks and strengthen DRM for communities. Disaster risk literacy is defined as:

“…the ability of an individual to access, read, understand, and use the information necessary to make informed decisions and follow instructions in the context of mitigation, preparation, response, and recovery during a disaster.”

For example:

  • At the individual level: Disaster risk literacy helps to create awareness of the risks associated with a particular disaster and prepare a person to take action to reduce the impacts. It can also help to build individual resilience through skills, knowledge, and resources needed to prepare and respond to disasters.
  • At the community or organizational level: Disaster risk literacy helps to create a culture of safety and resilience. It can help organizations identify and assess risks, develop plans and strategies to prepare for and respond to disasters, and build resilient communities.

    • Health education activities to mitigate disaster risk involves

  • understanding the factors that contribute to disaster risk,
  • being aware of the potential impact of disasters on individuals and communities, and
  • the local capacity to take appropriate action to reduce risk. It is also important to acknowledge stakeholders in communities, e.g. governments, civil societies.

    • Good knowledge and understanding of hazard risks help to empower individuals, organizations and communities to be better prepared and take action to reduce risks, build resilience and mitigate disaster impacts.