A health crisis is an emergency or complex health system that affects the public in one or more geographic areas from a particular locality to encompass the entire planet. Health crises generally have significant impacts on community health, loss of life, and on the economy. They may result from disease, industrial processes or poor policy.[1][2]
Having lost their homes in the 2010 Haiti earthquake, many Haitians now live in precarious camps.
Its severity is often measured by the number of people affected by its geographical extent, or the disease or death of the pathogenic process which it originates.[3][4]
Generally there are three key components in health crises:[5]
Alarm care: Poor communication of risks to the population resulting in social upheaval.[7]
Types
Environmental
Food
Toxic
Using the health warning systems. A health system responsive to the needs of the population is required to refine the instruments to ensure adequate preparation before their hatching.[8][9][10]
Transparency of the institutions public or private. The perception of crisis can escape the control of experts or health institutions, and be determined by stakeholders to provide solutions propagate or concerned. This requires a difficult balancing of the need to articulate clear answers and the little-founded fears.[11]
Adequate information policy. Irrationality arise when information is distorted, or hidden. Face a health crisis involves: respect for society, coordination of organizations and an institution with scientific weight to the people and to the media, who acted as spokesman in situations of public health risk, to get confidence citizens. The technical capacity of health professionals is more proven than the public officials, which suggests a greater share of the former and better training of the second.[12][13][14]
Evaluate the previous crisis or others experiences. Crises are challenges that must be learned from both the mistakes and successes, since they serve to bring about to the devices and improve the response to other crises. It is important to perform analysis of previous responses, audit risk and vulnerability, research and testing, and drills to prepare themselves against future crises.[15][16][17]
Having objectives: "first, to reduce the impact of illness and death, and second, to avoid social fracture".[18]
Preparing contingency plans. Preparation is key to the crisis because it allows a strong response, organized, and scientifically based. Action plans must meet the professional early enough and properly trained, and politicians must be consistent in their actions and coordinate all available resources. It is essential to invest in public health resources to prepare preventive measures and reducing health inequalities to minimize the impact of health crises, as they generally always the poorest suffer most.[19][20]
It is important to include all health professions especially primary health care (family physicians, pharmacists, etc.), as often it is these practitioners that are on the front-line in health crises.[21][22]
Baby born to a mother who had taken thalidomide while pregnantMetro of Mexico, passengers are protected against influenza A.Symptoms of microcephaly, linked to mothers infected by Zika virus[23]
2008: The 2008 Chinese milk scandal was a food safety incident in China, involving milk and infant formula, and other food materials and components, adulterated with melamine.
Weinstein, Robert A. (2004-06-03). "Planning for Epidemics — The Lessons of SARS". New England Journal of Medicine. 350 (23): 2332–2334. doi:10.1056/nejmp048082. ISSN0028-4793. PMID15175434.
Watson KE. The Roles of Pharmacists in Disaster Health Management in Natural and Anthropogenic Disasters. [Thesis]. QUT ePrints: Queensland University of Technology; 2019 Available from: https://eprints.qut.edu.au/130757/ .
A/H5, The Writing Committee of the World Health Organization (WHO) Consultation on Human Influenza (29 September 2005). "Avian Influenza A (H5N1) Infection in Humans". The New England Journal of Medicine. 353 (13): 1374–1385. CiteSeerX10.1.1.730.7890. doi:10.1056/NEJMra052211. PMID16192482.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
Mozaffarian, Dariush; Katan, Martijn B.; Ascherio, Alberto; Stampfer, Meir J.; Willett, Walter C. (13 April 2006). "Trans Fatty Acids and Cardiovascular Disease". The New England Journal of Medicine. 354 (15): 1601–1613. doi:10.1056/NEJMra054035. PMID16611951.
