CHARACTERISTICS OF THE EPIDEMIOLOGICAL SITUATION IN AREAS OF MILITARY CONFLICTS AND ANTHROPOGENIC DISASTERS

Abstract

This article presents an overview of the characteristics pointing out the deterioration of the epidemiological situation during military conflicts and anthropogenic disasters drawing form the latest literature. There are particular conditions that can provoke emergencies, among them military conflicts, natural disasters, humanitarian crises, man-made disasters, the use of biological weapons, particularly within the context of the Russian military invasion of Ukraine. The emergency conditions according to the principles of the sanitary and epidemiological service involve sudden and often unpredictable disruptions to normal everyday circumstances. These disruptions stem from disasters, natural calamities, and their aftermath, resulting in significant human casualties and widespread illness.
 The most important factors affecting the development of epidemiological circumstances include violations of the water supply system, contamination of food products, washing away various chemicals into water bodies, flooding of natural biocenoses, crowding, stress, increased sensitivity to infections, intensive migration processes. The complete or partial destruction of the material and technical base of health care and the sanitary-epidemiological service with disruption of the activities of medical and preventive institutions in the occupied territories also significantly affects the epidemiological situation. Given the eastern and southern regions in Ukraine, the emergency situation with severe epidemic complications has been observed for a year in the cities and villages occupied by Russians. As a result of serious violations of living conditions in disaster areas, war zones, and occupied territories, the epidemic situation regarding intestinal infections, including typhoid, paratyphoid, viral hepatitis, dysentery, and salmonellosis, has sharply worsened. Moreover, the increase in the incidence of them occurs in the first weeks after the action of the extreme factor. Crowding of people contributes to the intensification of aerosol contamination. Particularly dangerous in this regard are meningococcal disease, viral pneumonia, diphtheria and other contagious diseases. In addition, the high risk of critical deterioration of the epidemiological situation in Ukraine causes a high probability of the use of chemical and biological weapons by russians.