ABSTRACT
CONTENTS 18.1 Introduction................................................................................. 366 18.2 Models of Preparedness for Public Health Emergencies ............... 368
18.2.1 Single-Hazard Approaches.............................................. 368 18.2.2 All-Hazards and Multi-Hazard Approaches .................... 369 18.2.3 Improving Healthcare Infrastructure and Access ............ 371 18.2.4 The Models We Use and Why We Use Them .............. 372
18.3 Implications of Preparedness Models............................................ 373 18.3.1 The Relationship between Preparedness
and Human Rights..................................................... 373 18.3.2 Preparedness and Bioethics......................................... 374 18.3.3 Preparedness and Social Justice .................................. 375
18.4 Conclusion................................................................................... 376 References ............................................................................................... 376
18.1 Introduction Every year more than ten million children under the age of five die unnecessarily [1]. Atleast two million die from diarrhea and lower respiratory tract infections alonemostly in developing countries [2]. These deaths could easily be prevented by environmental interventions and treatments that are both simple and inexpensive. Even in the developed world, readily preventable deaths are commonplace. Every year more than 18,000 people under the age of 65 die prematurely for lack of health insurance in the United States. Many are felled by disease, some by accidents. (The mortality rate among uninsured car crash victims is 37 percent higher than it is for the insured and, among uninsured women with breast cancer, it is 30-50 percent higher [3].) Most of us are either unaware of or impervious to these deaths, perhaps because they are not all triggered by any single, dramatic event. These fatalities are quotidian losses, rarely addressed-or even mentioned-by mainstream Western media. The dead are nameless because there are too many names.
