New guidelines on disaster management released

New Delhi (PTI): With natural and man-made disasters taking a heavy toll, the country is now gearing up to prevent mass casualties during calamities by setting up specialised trauma centres, burn facilities, blood banks and integrated ambulance network.

According to the guidelines prepared by the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), which were released here on wednesday, emergency medical response at incident site, evacuation of casualties and hospital disaster management planning both for acute and chronic health effects would be rigorously followed to prevent large scale deaths during disasters.

The guidelines, prepared by a number of experts, specialists and representatives from the nodal Health and Family Welfare Ministry as well as other departments focus on prevention of deaths by preparing integrated disease control programmes.

"We prepared the guidelines after conducting mock exercises at 12 different places in the country," General (retd) N C Vij, Vice Chairman of the NDMA, told reporters. The guidelines also espouse a mechanism for minimum standards of relief and provision for rehabilitation and reconstruction and media management.

"We also need to incorporate community-based practices to develop a resilient community," Lt Gen J R Bharadwaj, member of the NDMA said, adding medical preparedness for mass casualty management will also get a mainstay in the education curricula.