Health Issues and Disaster Risk Reduction Perspectives in China

Abstract

With environmental degradation and rapid urbanisation, China is one of the most severely affected countries in terms of the number of disasters, human causalities and economic losses. As one of the most important indicators of disaster risk reduction, disaster-related death has been reduced in recent years due to the improvement of capacity on disaster management. As key components of primary prevention under the Health Emergency and Disaster Risk Management (Health-EDRM) framework, the emergency medical and public health response and disease surveillance system have been largely strengthened. However, the health sector in China was often only involved in the later stage of disaster response. As highlighted in the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030, the international community of disaster risk reduction is calling for a widened emphasis for the health sector to employ a more proactive approach in future disaster risk reduction-related affairs. Although the newly established Ministry of Disaster Management of China has integrated the duties previously scattered in many government departments, the health sector remains not directly included in its structure. Preventive measures including primary care resilience, health infrastructure safety code and hospital emergency plan are still not in place in many areas of the country. There is an urgent need to build a framework and mechanism to ensure a better involvement of health into new China disaster management system, as highlighted in the Health-EDRM framework.