All India Disaster Mitigation Institute, India

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"Understanding and using the concept of humanitarianism is essential. Right to life with dignity, especially of the poor during a calamity, is of great concern to us." - H H Lucas Sircar, Coadjutor Archbishop of Kolkata ||||| "Mainstreaming mitigation and increasing levels of satisfaction among victims are the two biggest challenges facing the eastern states of India. India needs to develop its capacity to face these challenges." - Francis P U, Head of Emergency Department, Caritas-India ||||| "AIDMI is frequently invited to participate in national and international humanitarian forums and thus is in a special position to advocate for field-based disaster management issues." - Amar Jyoti Nayak, Action Aid ||||| "AIDMI is a small, quiet voice that is gaining respect internationally. It has earned this reputation from painstaking work and total honesty. You will find nothing reported by AIDMI that is not true, and you will not find AIDMI boasting of achievements that it does not deserve." - Tony Vaux, Humanitarian Initiative, UK |||||

Emergency Health Unit
Disaster: an opportunity for better health education and training.

Emergency Health Unit (EHU) is striving to achieve health security of disaster affected victims through a risk mitigative approach. It promotes emergency health issues across the broad spectrum of disaster management cycles through capacity building at local and state levels.

Origin:
The Emergency Health Unit evolved from:

Provision of Food Security and Nutritional Support to Malaria Victim Women in Gujarat: Relief Project with Oxfam (India) Trust, 1997
Building Fodder Security System for Arid Areas with Banaskantha DWACRA Mahila Sewa Association, 1995
Providing relief for the victims of malaria epidemic in north Gujarat in 1997
Documenting the plague epidemic in Surat in 1995
Conducting review of health issues among the victims of January 26, 2001 earthquake in the slums of Bhuj
Conducting review of emergency health issues of riot victims of Ahmedabad, June, 2002

Objectives:

Effectively integrate community based health issues in emergency response and mitigation measures.
Creatively promote current emergency and crisis issues in the health sector.
Suitably focus on turning health crisis as an opportunity for promoting the right to safer health.

Activities:
1. Develop Health Security Assessments.
2. Organise Health Emergency Interface events.
3. Create and maintain emergency health intervention database.
4. Promote and support community initiatives with technical, managerial and financial inputs.

Recent Activities:

Medical camps in disaster affected areas of Gujarat
Training course on Incident Command Officer (ICO) for Doctors.
Training course on Emergency Medical Response for NGO staff, Schools staff, Community leaders and Panchayati Raj Institutions
Action Advocacy theme on HIV/AIDS mitigation and humanitarian sector
Ongoing training course on Emergency Medical Response to Industrial and Academic Instiltutes's staff organised with Ahmedabad Management Association (AMA)
First aid kits handed over to disaster affected schools with guidelines
Awareness material on School Safety and First Aid developed in local languages and distributed to disaster affected schools in Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and, Jammu and Kashmir

Key Lessons:
1. Augment what exists: victims do know and act on their own health issues.
2. Always innovate: experiment with established ideas and ongoing initiatives to increase quality and reduce costs.
3. Learn to link: with open flow of information and concrete joint work.
4. Strategically strive: for better and effective performance in delivery.
5. Comminity Capacity Building.

Using medical professionals in victim communities in Bhuj Slums.