The role of environmental health in disaster management: an overview and review of barriers and facilitators for action

Abstract

Environmental health has a significant role to play in all stages of disaster management, from planning through to recovery. The conceptualizetion of the environmental health role by environmental health practitioners and other disciplines involved with disaster management is the focus of this review. To provide context for this discussion, we present an overview of disasters and disaster management and the public health and environmental health impact of disasters. The literature indicates that the role of environmental health in disaster management is not clearly conceptualized, and the following barriers have been identified: the continued emergence of environmental health as a professional discipline, ambiguity about environmental health functions in disasters, limited representation in disaster planning, low visibility profile of the profession, positioning of environmental health within public health, power and politics within agencies that result in a narrow assignment of the environmental health role, and a top-down approach to disaster management. The Australian experience indicates that if environmental health practitioners can overcome such barriers and increase their involvement in disaster management, then this achievement will raise the profile of the profession and renegotiate the environmental health role in disaster management. Ultimately, this success will also improve our capacity to manage disaster situations, and the higher profile, greater recognition, and representation of environmental health that is gained will then be able to flow into normal day-to-day activities.