The COVID-19 pandemic has posed major challenges to public health systems across the world. Meanwhile, vaccination has been developed and delivered at record speed, while its application has been limited by vaccine hesitancy, which refers to “a delay in acceptance or refusal of vaccination despite the availability of vaccination services”, defined by the World Health Organization (WHO) strategic advisory group of experts (WHO SAGE). This can be due to various reasons at various levels, such as misinformation, lack of trust in the healthcare system, or personal beliefs and values. It is a complex problem, resulting in challenges in understanding and designing targeted interventions to solve it.

A venue for all

The 16th Vaccine Congress held in Italy aimed to address vaccine-related issues and to build health system resilience by discussing the latest advancements in vaccine research, development and implementation. The congress brought together leading experts from the fields of vaccinology, public health, medicine, epidemiology, and social sciences, who discussed the challenges posed by vaccine development, vaccine delivery and vaccine hesitancy and ways to overcome them. 

As one of the early career researchers in vaccine hesitancy, it is a great opportunity for me to discuss this issue with researchers from other backgrounds and understand the hesitancy problem through a broader lens. During the conference, our discussions centred around the importance of promoting accurate information about vaccines, improving communication between healthcare providers and the public, and increasing public trust in the healthcare system. In addition, we also discussed whether vaccination is actually safe and what kind of vaccination is safer. Admittedly, these questions were hard to answer and the only reliable evidence is the data from RCTs (in short term). However, it opens a new way for understanding the vaccine hesitancy problem – the vaccine itself has created the ideal conditions for mistrust to thrive, due to its complexity and variability of development and evaluation. To solve this problem, more collaboration is needed between experts from vaccine R&D, health education, behaviour science and more.

The role of social media

One of the most-impressed presentations was “addressing vaccine hesitancy:  integrating the Vaccine Trust Gauge and effective communication to advance confidence and uptake”, given by Prof Scott Ratzan, from CUNY School of Public Health and Health Policy. His speech highlighted the role of media in shaping public perception of vaccines and emphasized the need for health organizations to engage with the public and correct misinformation about vaccines on mass media and social media. In particular, social media platforms have become a major source of information for many people, and the spread of false information about vaccines on these platforms can lead to confusion and fear. In turn, this can lead to lower vaccine uptake and increase the risk of outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases.

However, the role of social media in shaping public perception of vaccines is crucial, and it is essential for health organizations to engage with the public on these platforms. Health organizations can use social media to correct misinformation about vaccines, provide accurate information, and address the concerns of the public, which is the way to build public trust and increase vaccine uptake. It can also be used to promote positive stories and experiences of people who have been vaccinated. By using social media in a proactive and strategic way, health organizations can counter the spread of misinformation about vaccines and help to increase public understanding of the importance of vaccination.

Admittedly, it is also important to note that social media can also be used to spread false information and to promote anti-vaccine messages. Health organizations must be vigilant in monitoring social media and must take action to counter false information and misinformation. They can do this by partnering with trusted sources, such as public health organizations and scientific institutions, to provide accurate information about vaccines.

Challenges at community-level

Another key area of discussion was the importance of involving communities in the decision-making process about vaccines. In the second day of the conference, a roundtable discussion was held to make the statement on multisectoral actions for building trust to promote vaccine acceptance. I was fortunately involved in the discussion and shared my opinions. The discussion emphasized the need for health organizations to listen to the concerns of the public, provide clear and concise information about vaccines, and involve communities in the planning and implementation of vaccine programs. The challenges for addressing vaccine hesitancy at the community level includes:

1. Misinformation and distrust: The spread of misinformation and false information about vaccines can lead to confusion and distrust among the public. This can be particularly challenging for health organizations, as people are often exposed to a large amount of information from a variety of sources, including social media, friends, and family.
2. Personal beliefs and values: individuals may have personal beliefs or values that conflict with getting vaccinated. For example, they may believe that vaccines are unnatural or harmful, or that they are not necessary.
3. Lack of access to accurate information: communities may not have access to accurate information about vaccines, or may not understand the benefits of vaccination. This can lead to misunderstandings and reluctance to get vaccinated.
4. Healthcare provider distrust: individuals may not trust healthcare providers or the healthcare system, which can make them reluctant to get vaccinated.
5. Barriers to accessing vaccines: communities may face barriers to accessing vaccines, such as poverty, lack of transportation, or limited access to healthcare.
6. Resistance to change: individuals may resist getting vaccinated because they have always lived a certain way and are resistant to changing their habits or beliefs.

To address these challenges, several discussions were made between experts from different background, including researcher, healthcare workers, vaccine company staff, community workers and the public. They provided many insightful strategies to solve this problem.  A statement paper proposed the framework for engaging multiple sectors for building vaccine trust was under preparation and will be published following the conference.

The congress also discussed the importance of providing equitable access to vaccines, particularly for marginalized communities. The speakers emphasized the need to address the root causes of vaccine hesitancy, such as poverty, lack of education, and poor access to healthcare, in order to ensure that everyone has access to vaccines.

Strengthen health system resilience

The congress also highlighted the importance of building a strong health system in order to improve vaccine uptake. The speakers discussed the need for investment in health systems to increase access to vaccines, improve the quality of care, and ensure that health systems are prepared to respond to the next public health crisis. It provided a new way for me to reconsider the role of my research in the health system and DRR.

Firstly, vaccine hesitancy can have a significant impact on the health system, both in terms of public health outcomes and healthcare costs. When individuals are reluctant or refuse to get vaccinated, it can lead to outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases, which can put vulnerable populations, such as the elderly, young children, and individuals with weakened immune systems, at risk. Outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases can also put a strain on the healthcare system, as more resources are needed to diagnose and treat cases and to control the spread of the disease. Secondly, vaccine hesitancy can lead to increased healthcare costs, as individuals who are not vaccinated are more likely to require medical care, including hospitalization, for vaccine-preventable diseases. This can put a strain on healthcare budgets, particularly in resource-limited settings, and can divert resources away from other important healthcare needs. In addition to the impact on public health and healthcare costs, vaccine hesitancy can also undermine efforts to achieve herd immunity, which is critical for controlling the spread of vaccine-preventable diseases. 

Overall, attending the 16th Vaccine Congress was a valuable and enriching experience for me as a PhD student. It provided a valuable opportunity to deepen my understanding of the current challenges and strategies for addressing vaccine hesitancy. During the conference, I had the opportunity to listen to leading experts in the field, and to engage in discussions with other researchers, healthcare professionals, and policymakers. This helped me to gain a comprehensive understanding of the current state of knowledge on vaccine hesitancy, and to identify areas for future research and inquiry, and enhance my own PhD project. I am grateful for the opportunity to attend this important event, and I look forward to continuing to engage with others in the field to advance our understanding of this important issue.

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More information about the Vaccine Congress Series, can be found at: https://eventsignup.ku.dk/needs2022/conference. Programme for 16^th vaccine congress can be found here.

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I would like to gratefully acknowledge the China Scholarship Council and University College London for funding my PhD study and the UCL Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction for funding the expenses for me to attend the 16th Vaccine Congress in Italy. I would like to appreciate my supervisors Prof Patty Kostkova and Dr Caroline Wood for providing guidance to support my PhD research. 

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Lan Li is a PhD student at IRDR dPHE. Her research topic is integrating behavioural science into digital intervention to increase vaccine confidence. She is interested in social media research, digital public health, and vaccine hesitancy studies.

Author: Jarle Eid

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Researchers from University College London, Haukeland University Hospital, National Defense University in Sweden and the University of Bergen met in January for a working meeting on a joint research project focusing on how operational psychology can inform municipality responses and resilience to disruptive events.

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What kind of operational situations are seen as most challenging and difficult to handle for fire and rescue workers? How did the COVID-19 pandemic influence operational capacity and resilience in the Fire and Rescue Services? What future training and educational needs are seen as most important to develop resilient fire and rescue services? What can we learn from cross national comparisons of fire and rescue services in London and in Bergen?

These and other questions are being explored based on in depth interviews with first responders in a cross-country comparison of Fire and Rescue services in Bergen and in London. The study is supported by a grant from the Regional Research Fund in Western Norway, the Fire and Rescue services in Bergen, and the Greater London Authorities.

We are very pleased to have this opportunity to collaborate with Professor Ilan Kelman and Associate Professor Gianluca Pescaroli on this new project. Here we are exploring three main issues. One is how the fire end rescue services were affected by the protracted covid situation, secondly we explore and collect examples of difficult operational situation, and thirdly, we explore training and development areas.

A particularly exciting issue is that in this project we have been collecting data both from Norway and from the U.K. and a cross national comparisons will be a true advantage to this project. In January we had the first joint working group meeting in Bergen, Norway and in April we will have the second working group meeting in London with our UCL colleagues.

 

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Jarle Eid is Professor of Work and Organizational Psychology in the Department of Psychosocial Science, University of Bergen. 

Following the UK’s exit from the European Union, the legacy leftover from the EU’s Water Framework and Flood Directives, which jointly encourage sustainable management of flood risk, lives on. The UK has seen a number of similar national policy frameworks implemented aiming to reduce flood risk while improving water quality and biodiversity, with over 100 river restoration projects seen in London alone between 2000 and 2019. Most of these efforts are geared towards sustainability in the face of climate change, but, with regards to the long-term, the river itself is often left out of the plans.

The historic human efforts to manage rivers have been progressively called into question over their sustained maintenance costs and an incongruity with environmental and ecological health. An alternative solution is to renaturalise and restore natural processes—reconnecting rivers with their floodplains, reintroducing wild species, run-off targeted tree planting—but this would also be to submit to a changing and dynamic landscape. Rivers can change course—sometimes very suddenly—or silt-up and become unnavigable. True sustainability should therefore account for the long term changes of rivers, but these changes are rarely accounted for in flood risk management policy. As Andrew Revkin asks: “sustain what?”

The problem with “natural”

The problem is partially semantical. The terms renaturalisation, restoration, and rewilding carry with them the image of an implied prior state or a “Lost Paradise”. Ironically, it is precisely the long legacy of human engineering, which some modern schemes are trying to reverse, that denies us the knowledge of a natural state; it is difficult to look into the past, when the waters are so muddied by our imprint. As a result, our ability to assess the future impact of renaturalisation is equally hindered. 

Arguably nowhere in the UK is this problem illustrated better than in the Somerset Levels, which as far back as the roman occupation of Britain has seen artificial drainage and reclamation in order to take advantage of its pastoral and arable potential. At present, the flat, largely reclaimed floodplain relies heavily on a vast network of excavated drainage ditches (rhynes in the local vernacular), sluice gates (clyces), and pumping stations that push the water through the highly banked and augmented river channels; a £100 million tidal barrier has just been approved on the River Parrett, while existing rivers continue to be enlarged to carry extra flood water. Clearly, it is hard to imagine what natural means in this context.

Seeing Into the Past

Fortunately, remnants of abandoned rivers—palaeochannels—that have long since stopped flowing through the Levels litter its landscape and offer a glimpse into the past. There are numerous examples of such ancient rivers still visible on the Somerset landscape today, which often surface during high flood stages, but are now easily identifiable with the advent of Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) technology, which provides high-resolution elevation data. Palaeochannels have been of interest to researchers in this area because they reveal historic drainage patterns, showing in which direction rivers used to flow before being redirected or abandoned long ago.

Where archaeological records are unavailable—often early in or before human occupation—the reasons for change are less clear. Were the causes human made, or related to a historical climatic shift? And could this inform the way we plan rivers today? To find out more, it is necessary to dig deeper into the landscape. 

Seeing Beneath the Surface

Beneath the sediment that buries them are rivers preserved from a past time. Within the sediment is contained information from the processes and conditions that presided over the river’s eventual abandonment. Here we can see the geometry of the river and look for signs of erosion and migration, and indicators for the causes of abandonment.

To overcome the logical problem of seeing buried features, geophysical methods offer a quick and non-invasive way of imaging the subsurface. By applying a force to the ground and measuring a response from beneath, a model of the rivers can be produced. These methods have been tested extensively by scientists for many years in a variety of environments, including floodplain sediments, and are in the UK probably most famously associated with Time Team’s “geofizz”, due to their strong archaeological applications. 

This research uses a combination of electrical resistivity, seismic refraction, and ground penetrating radar methods to image the buried cross-section of ancient rivers. In this way, the river acts as an archaeological feature for investigating the past, and is hoped to provide reference states for river systems that have existed prior to and throughout different periods of human occupation. Surveys have been completed on two sites on either side of the River Parrett, clearly showing the extent of the historical river systems. More are to follow at different sites across the Somerset Levels. 

Glimpsing into the past of ancient river systems could help in planning for the future development of renaturalised rivers, by exploring scenarios where the measures that humans (and rivers) have grown accustomed to are absent. It may be that, like a river, management plans must be dynamic and adaptable to natural change; otherwise, a one-size-fits-all approach to sustainability is bound to become unsustainable.

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To find out more about this project, email me at joshua.anthony.19@ucl.ac.uk

Josh Anthony is a PhD Candidate at IRDR and Editor of the IRDR blog.

Aisha Aldosery

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Mosquitos are a fundamental part of testing the novel idea of my PhD, which focuses on developing intervention tools to support developing an early warning system to control the mosquito, thus, combatting mosquito-borne diseases. However, with the COVID-19 pandemic, it was quite hard to fly to Brazil, considered one of the Latin American countries that was hit hard by mosquito-borne disease and has a strong program for mosquito surveillance. Therefore, conducting my fieldwork in a different location was more feasible, such as the Portuguese island of Madeira, located in the northeastern Atlantic Ocean, 900 km from mainland Portugal. A volcanic and subtropical island which seems like a perfect location for mosquitoes, it introduced an efficient program in 2005 focusing on mosquito surveillance. Four field trips have been conducted since November 2021 with Patty Kostkova, my primary supervisor, to achieve my project’s overarching goal. We worked together in designing and presenting several workshops on Madeira mobile app surveillance with the local environmental agents, as well as deploying several devices in the fields for environmental monitoring.

Trip One – Mosquito Ovitrap IOT-based System pilot system.

This trip was the first to Madeira after the COVID-19 pandemic; the trip was in late October 2021 and lasted for about three weeks. The main objectives of my first fieldwork trip (three weeks) were to establish a new collaboration with people from ITI / LARSyS, introduce and discuss my PhD idea with the team, and lastly, build a prototype version of the proposed system. Although the trip was considered short, we achieved a significant project milestone. During this trip, we started by calibrating the water sensors, building the IoT-based unit and deploying the prototype version of the MOISS system to understand how various weather and water parameters influence mosquito breeding and habitat favouring. The first version of the system has been deployed and running since November 2021 at the Natural History Museum of Funchal on Madeira Island. All timely data collected in the field by the sensors, such as the air temperature, humidity, pressure, water temperature, pH, DO, and conductivity, will be used along with the entomological data collected by the environmental agents to design and build a model to provide us with a better understanding of the mosquito’s development and presence.

Trip Two – Introducing Madeira Mosquito Surveillance App 

This trip was mainly about the project’s second component, which is about designing a mosquito surveillance app based on the local settings to be adopted by the environmental agents during their routine visits to the mosquito traps. To achieve that, establishing another collaboration with the local health sector is essential. The trip includes a couple of meetings and a workshop:

• Meetings with Dr Bruna Ornelas de Gouveia, Regional Directorate of Health in Madeira Island, to discuss and design the collaboration protocol with the UCL IRDR Centre for Digital Public Health in Emergencies (dPHE). The collaboration entitles us to pilot our app on the island and gives us access to historical mosquito density data.
• Meeting with the technical and GIS team, who showed us the mosquito data, hotspot maps and the effective strategies adopted by the local government to control mosquitoes across the island (https://www.iasaude.pt/Mosquito/ ).
• We ran the first workshop with the environmental agents to introduce the idea of the surveillance app and how it could positively affect their work. During this workshop, we presented some showcases from our Brazilian project (Belmont) and a prototype of the Madeira app. The agents demonstrated different scenarios that could happen on the ground and what actions needed to be considered in each scenario. Finally, we had an interactive session, a very productive session that helped us understand the local settings in different conditions.

Trip Three – Mosquito Ovitrap IOT-based System (MOISS) Large Deployment.

The third fieldwork was the most significant and challenging trip as many milestones needed to be completed, including the IoT-based system units implementation and deployment, along with a lot of logical preparation. Yet, it was one of the most exciting trips to see the theories and paper design coming true. This trip was from July to the beginning of August 2022 (four weeks). The focus of this trip was the MOISS system. During this trip, we calibrated and tested 60 water sensors in a week period, which required specific weather conditions. Then, two engineers from ITI / LARSyS and I assembled 17 system units in a week, including the testing and debugging of each unit. The conducted lab testing was quite challenging, resulting in several issues, including problems with the manufactured IoT shield, slow network connections, power, etc. We ended up with 13 devices deployed across the capital of the Island, Funchal. The decision about how many devices and where to deploy them was collaborative work with environmental agents and the technical team to select suitable study sites based on several criteria, including technical, logistic and mosquito data. The locations include schools, hospitals, one university, the port, and a private building.

Trip Four – Madeira Mosquito Surveillance App Piloting Workshop

The last trip of this year (September 2022) was a four-day trip for Madeira. The main objective of this trip was to run a three-hour workshop with the environmental agents to show them the first completed developed version of the app, which is designed and implemented based on the requirements collected in the first workshop (second trip). Patty and I gave the agents technical support to install, operate and test the app for about two hours. After that, we had a one-hour interactive session to collect their inputs, which will help us improve the app and develop another sufficient version. The agents were delighted with the mosquito surveillance app and were excited about the next phase, piloting the app for several months.

During this trip, the project gained the attention and interest of local Madeira TV, which was there during the workshop and interviewed Prof Patty Kostkova.

We are currently looking for funding to develop and deploy the mosquito surveillance mobile app and collect data on a large scale. Finally, although each trip had its challenge, some went differently than we had planned and expected. I have learned much beyond my research scope and gained knowledge on project management and building collaboration. Many thanks to Patty for accompanying me in each project phase and trip to support me in moving the project forward. We had a great time enjoying the weather, and more significantly, we managed to deploy our IoT system and pilot the surveillance app.

Acknowledgements

Trip one was fully funded by the UCL Institution of Risk and Disaster Reduction (IRDR); trip two was fully funded by UCL Mathematical and Physical Science Faculty, PhD Students Travel Grant; trip three was mainly funded by the  UCL IRDR Centre for Digital Public Health in Emergencies (dPHE) and partially by the UCL Institution of Risk and Disaster Reduction (IRDR); trip four was fully funded by my PhD sponsor, King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology, Saudi Arabia.

A big thanks and appreciation to our IRDR Finance team for their significant support which played a crucial role in helping me while preparing my PhD project. Special thanks to Matthew Lee for his outstanding support in managing equipment quotes and dealing with orders.

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Aisha Aldosery is currently a doctoral candidate at the UCL IRDR Centre for Digital Public Health in Emergencies at University College London. She is also a researcher at King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST), Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. She earned her master’s degree in Software System Engineering from UCL. Her broad research areas are software engineering and the Applied Internet of Things. She is particularly interested in designing and developing digital health intervention tools such as surveillance and early warning systems. She is also interested in designing environmental IoT-based sensor devices and analysing sensor data using machine learning methodologies. The focus of Aisha’s PhD research project is investigating mobile apps, the Internet of Things (IoT) and sensing technologies for predicting mosquito populations to combat vector-borne diseases – a pertinent global issue with global research significance.

Mhari Gordon is a PhD student at UCL-IRDR.

This blog was jointly posted with RADIX and COPE.

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This month, November 2022, I was fortunate enough to attend and present at the Northern European Emergency and Disaster Studies (NEEDS) Conference as well as participate in the preceding PhD workshop. The PhD workshop was run over a day and a half by Emmanuel Raju, Ksenia Chmutina, and JC Gaillard and attended by 18 PhD students. The workshop was a fantastic experience and great opportunity to meet enthusiastic disaster scholars.

The workshop kicked off with an activity mapping how our PhD research topics connected in terms of key concepts, methodologies, research subjects or objects, and geographical locations. Despite diversity in our research orientations and backgrounds, the mapping exercise highlighted overlaps. For example, many of our studies focus on groups which are under-represented individuals in disaster studies, such as genders beyond the binary, learning challenges, youth, and refugees. We also noticed a trend in using methodologies which sit more on the mixed and qualitative methods side, moving away from large-scale approaches observed in quantitative methods.

Moreover, we recognised and spoke about our experiences of using concepts such as vulnerability, resilience, and intersectionality. Terms which were originally critical ‘western’ concepts that have now turned into mainstream buzzwords and act as blanket and uniform (or universalism) approaches in disaster studies. There is a tension between reclaiming the true heterogeneous nature of such concepts, but also debating the need to move beyond them. Such concepts may not have the same meanings, or even exist, in all cultures and languages. New disaster studies need to be more reflective and critical by expanding out of the previous siloing and labelling as well as welcoming the diversity of cultural contexts. This led to us reflecting on our positionality in studying disasters and how to navigate this in terms of methodologies and sharing our messages with audiences. During the afternoon sessions, we started asking questions such as why is the research being done and who will benefit? We then analysed and critiqued a more extensive set of questions which is outlined in the RADIX Disaster Studies Accord (link).

The second morning was dedicated to publishing in disaster journals. The workshop facilitators and guests, including Christine Eriksen, Rodrigo Mena, Eefje Hendriks, and Ricardo Fuentealba, shared valuable and practical advice. The two key takeaways from the morning were to consider 1) the editors of a journal and 2) the format of publication. As authors of academic publications, we need to critically consider how we can best present and do justice to the messages that we are sharing. This may be in the likes of keeping parts of the text in the original language so that the local context and meaning are not lost in translation or interpreted with western-academic terms and norms. Or the likes of different formats to the standard academic paper such as a comic strip – which will be included in an upcoming issue of the Disaster Prevention and Management Journal (journal link).

The advice shared with the PhD students for publishing in Disaster journals was:

Ask colleagues and mentors about their experiences with different journals and seek their advice on which journal they think is most suitable for our manuscript.

Read the scope of the journal and if there is still uncertainty about whether our manuscript’s topic fits, then send an email to the editor(s) asking for their advice before formally submitting.

Look at which journals our citations and references, as well as scholars with similar research interests, have published in. This will give one an initial indication of the type of work which is accepted by the journal.

Editors can usually tell by the title and first few sentences of the manuscript whether it will be accepted for peer review or not – so our manuscript needs to be convincing from the start.

Do not panic if it is taking a few months between the manuscript being accepted for review and receiving feedback. It can take time to find appropriate and willing reviewers and for them to review the manuscript. There are also unexpected delays or interruptions during this process.

Finally, if the authenticity of the research and manuscript does not match the standardised format but fits within the scope of a journal, then we should not hesitate to contact the editor(s) to see if they are willing and able to find a creative solution!

Overall, the key message from the PhD workshop was to keep pushing the boundaries of disaster studies, in terms of concepts, methodologies, and assumptions, as well as how we share our research!

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More information about the NEEDS 2022 conference, including keynotes and panels, can be found at: https://eventsignup.ku.dk/needs2022/conference.

I would like to gratefully acknowledge the UCL Warning Research Centre for funding my PhD study and the UCL Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction for funding the expenses for me to attend the NEEDS 2022 Conference.

Written by Olivia Walmsley and Virginie Le Masson

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Yesterday, on the 7^th of March, the IRDR Centre for Gender and Disaster celebrated its fourth anniversary, providing a multi-disciplinary space for connecting researchers, students, policy makers, NGOs and anyone who shares a desire to work collaboratively to answer difficult questions that relate to gender (in)equality. This year, the theme is #BreakTheBias.

A gender equal world is one free of bias, discrimination, and stereotypes; three issues that we choose to challenge in academia and in our research practice. With gender equality being the central pillar of the centre, our work, particularly through the GRRIPP project connects existing networks of scholars, policy makers, and practitioners to support the integration of gender and intersectionality in research and development approaches. GRRIPP supports 22 projects across Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), and South Asia, that tackle gender inequality and bias head-on through a multitude of lenses such as documenting systems of care during the Covid-19 pandemic; bringing intersectionality in university curricula on Disaster Risk Reduction; or piloting women-based and low-carbon transport solutions in the context of climate change.

GRRIPP was recently host to an exploratory set of virtual events on the ‘Feminist City’. Featuring a diverse group of speakers from all geographical regions, debates focused on such questions as: “what is a feminist city?” and “what does feminism and the city mean in practice?” All five sessions are available for viewing here.

To find out more about these projects, head to the GRRIPP website and register to receive monthly newsletters which include project updates and information about the team and upcoming events.

The centre is involved in several projects that bring a gender perspective to different sectors:

• Health: Who Cares? Rebuilding Care in a Post-Pandemic World (funded by ESRC). We support a deeper understanding of the care economy after the Covid-19 pandemic revealed the disproportionately negative impacts on women, particularly women of colour, migrants, and refugees, both as essential care workers and as recipients of care.
• Disaster Risk Reduction: RiskPACC (funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020) to facilitate interaction between citizens and Civil Protection Authorities to jointly identify needs and develop solutions to build enhanced disaster resilience, based on new forms of digital, community-centred and gender-responsive data.

In addition to the exciting work happening through these various projects, our team has also been tackling gender bias through the collection of references as part of the Gender and Disaster Reference Guide Series. The bibliography series (now available as a database) compiles journal articles, blogs, reports etc. that cover themes in disaster-related research with a gender perspective. The next volume will prioritise references written in various languages, other than English, to diversify sources of knowledge and perspectives.

To find out more on the Centre’s research interests and current activities, please visit our webpages and do not hesitate to contact us to share interests and ideas for collaboration.

Centre for Gender and Disaster Website

#BreakTheBias #IWD2022

Twitter: @UCL_GD | @grripp

LinkedIn: @cgdonline

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The Centre for Gender and Disaster based in the Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction at UCL, aims to develop awareness of, and responsiveness to, gender considerations in the contexts of risks, disasters and conflicts, through excellence in research and teaching.

Following a challenging year of managing natural hazards, including COVID-19, this one-day online event provided thought-provoking talks, interactive discussions and online networking opportunities on why warnings matter. In addition, the UCL Warning Research Centre as part of the Department of Science and Technology Studies was launched. The event explored the role, design, use, and evaluation of warnings for different hazards from different stakeholder perspectives to examine how effective people-centered warning systems can be developed and help to be prepared for both the expected and unexpected. The event was hosted by the Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction and the Warning Research Centre.

On the 23^rd of June, the UCL Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction welcomed researchers, students, practitioners, policymakers, the media and the general public to a day of thought-provoking discussions on why warnings matter, and how we can do better at warnings both prior and during crises for all hazard types. Our in-house and guest experts presented a global perspective on the latest research and analysis through talks, interactive discussions and in conversation. We explored multi-dimensional aspects of warnings, considering their physical, social, economic, environmental, institutional, political, cultural and gendered dimensions, and the challenges involved in making warnings successful to mitigate against losses.

This blog is part one of a series presenting the key findings from the conference proceedings. The rapporteurs whose notes form this material are Calum MacKay and Simone Phillips who are both from the University of Glasgow on the MSc Earth Futures Programme.

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Part One.

Panel Discussion 1: Warning Systems ‒ Exceptional versus expected events

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The presenters for this session were Dr. Mickey Glantz, University of Colorado, Dr. Daniel Straub, Technical University of Munich, and Rebekah Yore, UCL. The session was moderated by Dr. Joanna Faure Walker, UCL.

Summaries of each presenters’ arguments are as follows:

Mickey Glantz

Not everyone considers a warning a warning. There are 5 key factors to warning hesitancy: complacency, convenience, confidence, low levels of trust, calculation of individual engagement. We don’t research the risks, collective responsibility is lacking as people focus on themselves. Emotional responses are common, not rational. There are also two types of people in hazard scenarios: risk averse people and risk takers.

Early warning systems are a chain. To make them more effective the lead time needs more attention. We need to create more lead time in order to get the warning to people earlier and through the system quicker.

Forecast hesitancy also plays a key role in effective early warning systems. We discount previous disasters we don’t learn from them, therefore we reinstate old vulnerabilities.

Readiness is also missing, society doesn’t have resources for long term preparedness.

Daniel Straub

Calculating the effectiveness of warning systems. If people think it’s a false alarm they won’t comply. This then creates a child who cries wolf scenario for future hazard warnings. We must find the right balance between detection rate and false alarm rate.

It is challenging and near impossible to quantify effectiveness but can still help the study of warning systems.

Rebekah Yore

It is important to identify the vulnerable population when deploying early warning systems. Failure in one element of the warning system can cause failure for the entire system.

Her research focuses on 3 case studies, all islands that are used to hazards: Japan 2011- Tsunami, Philippines 2013- typhoon and Dominica 2017- Hurricane. In all case studies not one warning system reached everyone, therefore these places need multiple types of warning. Some of the issues with the current warning systems were that interestingly modern smartphone warnings did not reach people. There was also mixed messaging from different agencies and government sources leading to room for interpretation from locals. Furthermore, issues such as poverty were not taken into account.

Finally, it must be noted that Individual and group risk perceptions are always changing and are dynamic.

This discussion was then followed by an address to questions from the audience, which are summarised thus:

How do we deal with both false alarms but also misinformation particularly in the context of social media or governments giving misinformation? How can we include groups who are not familiar with local warning systems like tourists or newcomers?

Mickey Glantz

Tourists have never seen a false alarm so unlikely to be affected in the same way in a real event by locals who have faced false alarms. Use of drills is helpful because one of the issues that comes up in the social sciences is that we all recognise that warnings need to be built into our everyday lives. We need to practice them as a way of living rather than just facing them when a hazard approaches. What has become practice then takes over and people are able to respond really quite calmly and really quite cohesively as Mickey thinks drills are a really good mechanism for embedding some key practices that help to familiarise through everyday life with some lifesaving rules.

What can we do to protect assets and livelihoods in the context of warnings?

Rebekah Yore

It is something that requires more research. Preparation mechanisms such as micro insurance for example are very important. So it may be that a mechanism that allows people to put things out and places structures in place before it occurs can help to protect some of those assets and livelihoods. Whether this means the ability to be able to pack things up and leave a location, or ability to be able to move, or an ability to be able to put certain protective measures in place. Maybe not save everything but save something or save enough.

Mickey Glantz

We don’t understand probabilities. We don’t understand nature. Many people don’t really understand the risks in their area. These perceptions become reality, if our perceptions are wrong the actions we take based on them have real consequences. So we tend to look at disasters as in many cases one and done.  But that’s not reality.

In one sentence what change do you think needs to occur to help with warning for exceptional events in an environment that does have expected events?

Daniel Straub

Understanding things through quantification is also to make use of all the data that we can now collect. The social sciences have a better understanding and also have models of factors that make a difference, and it would be useful for social science to do more with quantification in their research.

Rebekah Yore

Addressing structural inequality and addressing why people are disadvantaged and why other people aren’t. I think let’s just put our money where our mouth is; preparation is key.

Mickey Glantz

We have to put more emphasis on readiness and preparedness. People can get ready more easily than they can get prepared because they don’t have the resources. So, warnings are very important to them, I feel we have to push readiness as tactical responses to warnings and threats, as well as long term preparedness which seems to fall to governments and larger organisations. Readiness is for me and preparedness is for the community to deal with.

Next up in this blog series will be notes on “Warnings and the launch of the Warning Research Centre”, keynote speech from Assistant Secretary-General and Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction in the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, Mami Mizutori.

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Watch the full conference on youtube here!

Conference URL:

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/risk-disaster-reduction/events/2021/jun/ucl-irdr-11th-annual-conference-why-warnings-matter-and-ucl-warning-research-centre

Conference Rapporteurs: Simone Phillips and Calum Mackay

Conference Convener: Dr. Carina Fearnley

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Please email us for any further information at IRDR-comms@ucl.ac.uk

Or check out our website: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/risk-disaster-reduction/

Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction (IRDR), University College London (UCL)

Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, United Kingdom (UK)

Many of you may know well what it means to live through recurring hazards, such as annual seasons of tropical cyclones. Some of you will know how to protect yourselves and your families against the frightening but smaller storms. Some will know the catastrophic danger and absolute fear created by the larger ones (all in relative terms of course). Some will know what it means to live in evacuation centres and to be displaced in emergency shelters for weeks or even months at a time.

Whatever your experiences, imagine for a moment that you’ve never experienced a Category 5 hurricane before, unaware of what it could do to your family, friends and home; a person living in a wooden home on stilts over the ocean and unsure of what “storm surge” means; a farmer whose life depends on the pigs he keeps on his land around his home; an elderly woman having experienced a deadly disaster years ago but who is now completely dependent on her family to ensure her safety. Does experience or naivety help you make safer decisions? What happens if you want to leave for a shelter but the rest of your family doesn’t? What do you do if you keep animals on your homeland and can’t leave them behind? Or what if you hear a message on the radio that conflicts with advice you hear on the TV?

In our latest paper published in Disasters journal, Joanna Faure Walker and I have drawn on our fieldwork studies in the Philippines and Dominica to investigate what warnings people heard, when and where from in relation to how they then reacted before major tropical cyclones. In the Philippines, we took Super Typhoon Yolanda in 2013 (internationally known as Haiyan) as a case study, and in Dominica, we studied Major Hurricane Maria in 2017. The Philippines and the Caribbean experience annual tropical cyclone seasons, and so are accustomed to events that usually range between tropical depressions and Category 1-2 storms. However, we are particularly interested in examining what happens on rarer occasions, when these locations experience large Category 4 and giant Category 5 storms.

We found that among the people we surveyed in the two locations, a warning that both Yolanda and Maria were approaching was heard by all but one person before both storms arrived. These were often received with more than a day’s notice, however, over three quarters of our populations chose to either remain at home throughout the storms, leave for shelter during them, or leave for shelter once they had passed, not complying with direct instructions from the authorities to evacuate. Not the intention of those issuing the warnings, and not the safety seeking behaviours we would associate with a successful warning system.

Single sources of warning, such as a message through a radio only, failed to reach everyone in both locations, and so warnings issued across several media platforms were often the best way of ensuring as far as possible that the most people received a warning advisory. This is intuitively sensible, especially as some may fail at critical stages. However, in the Philippines, this had practical implications. Even though only around half of respondents heard a warning from two or more sources, slightly more people evacuated before Yolanda arrived when they heard two sources, rather than only one.

So if the warning system technology works, why did the desired human response not follow? We know from other studies that evacuation is tricky because of the complexities of people’s lives, and that people stay at home to protect their possessions, their livestock, to adhere to social pressures etc. But revealed in our surveys were a number of key elements that also deprived our respondents of a full appreciation of the heightened danger in these two cases. These tropical cyclones were more deadly than the average storm, but not realising the implications of “storm surge” because the term was widely unknown among respondents in the Philippines, signalled a failure in the messaging that almost certainly resulted in a higher death toll. Similarly, radio network breakdown during Maria’s very late and rapid intensification near Dominica meant that warning messages were confusing and Category 5 impacts were not expected. In such situations, people defaulted to their usual behaviour: stay at home and ride it out, it’s what normally works. And because both information pictures were incomplete, people were caught unaware.

In both locations, messages were reported to have been inconsistent and unclear, for example to evacuate if you live close to the water or in “vulnerable housing” (what does this even mean?) in the Philippines. Often these required people to exercise considerable levels of subjective judgement over several risk profiles, most notably their own and that of their locale. This necessitates, at the very least, a full hazard information picture. Additionally, evacuation and shelter infrastructure that should support warning messages and promote safety seeking behaviour was often so substandard that it was a deterrent. The inadequacy of many emergency shelters discouraged people from their use, being overcrowded, lacking in resources, offering little personal safety, and incurred physical damage themselves by the storms.

Our paper demonstrates that within the social processes of warning mechanisms, a failure at any stage can render them decidedly less effective in saving lives. It shows that warning systems require the support of accurate forecasting and message dissemination technology (improved hazard modelling, the acknowledgement of scientific risk uncertainty, robust and consistent communications networks, and context appropriate language), solid infrastructure (e.g. fit-for-purpose evacuation shelters) and an inherent consideration for the idiosyncrasies of populations at risk, taking into account “foreground” and “background” constraints and assumptions (these are explained in the paper, so go read it). It also suggests that experiencing more regular, lower intensity tropical cyclones may in itself not help reduce vulnerability to the more deadly effects of rare, higher-intensity storms.

Our full study and findings in more detail can be found here:

Yore, R., Walker, J.F. (2020). Early Warning Systems and Evacuation: Rare and Extreme vs Frequent and Small-Scale Tropical Cyclones in the Philippines and Dominica. Disasters, doi:10.1111/disa.12434

 

 

 

Last month, I was very fortunate to be able to participate in the delivery of a two-day workshop on Structural Mitigation and Increasing Resilience of Schools to Multi-Hazards in Manila, Philippines as part of the Philippines Resilience of Schools to Multi-Hazard (PRISMH) project. I joined the UCL EPICentre team in a visit to project collaborators De La Salle University (Manila) and Xavier University (Cagayan de Oro).

The workshop was based around methods, techniques and data used and collected as part of the actual PRISMH investigation, and introduced participants (attended came from academia, government, the private sector) to the most common deficiencies and failures observed in existing school infrastructure across the Philippines. As the Philippines is a multi-hazard environment, these weaknesses were examined in reference to exposed to various types of natural hazards including earthquake, flood and windstorm. Looking at the wide variety of the building typology and unpredictability of hazard intensity, different methods of data collection and exposure analysis were demonstrated in order to prioritise the most vulnerable structures, susceptible to life threatening damage and economic losses.

The physical integrity of buildings is only part of the story however, and the workshop also introduced knowledge and experience around challenges facing early warning systems, the identification, suitability and access to schools as emergency evacuation shelters and resource distribution hubs, as well as designing and implementing evacuation plans. I was there to represent the work and preliminary findings of Dr Joanna Faure Walker and Dr Alexandra Tsioulou, who emphasise the social importance of schools as centres of community, education institutions, and critically when a hazard risk arises, evacuation centres, emergency (and temporary) shelters, and aid distribution centres. My PhD work in the Philippines focusses on early warnings and temporary shelter in the Philippines, and so this was great way of exploring schools that function as shelters in more detail, as well as building relationships among key public, private and academic stakeholders.

The workshop was followed by a Stakeholders Forum first in Manila, and then in Xavier University in the city of Cagayan de Oro (CdeO), where the fieldwork campaign for PRISMH was conducted. This was my favourite part as it was a chance to report on the initial findings of the project and to engage the people at the heart of this research. It was a wonderful example of taking work back to where it originated, and of delivering real foundations on which people can adapt and build tools and resources that can help well beyond their original scope. The attendees included the Mayor of CdeO, officials from the Regional Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council (RDRRMC) and the Philippines Department of Education.

See the Xavier University news article here

About the PRISMH Project

Start: 1st April 2017 / End: 30th Sepember 2019

The PRISMH project, led by Prof Dina D’Ayala, Dr Carmine Galasso and Dr Joanna Faure Walker aims to develop an advanced resilience assessment framework for school infrastructure subjected to multiple natural hazards in the Philippines. The project investigates the effectiveness of buildings retrofit measures and social preparedness measures as means of preventing casualties, reducing economic losses and maintaining functionality of the school infrastructure and its role within the community in the event of natural disasters. In particular the project addresses risks from seismic, wind and flood hazards. The resilience assessment protocol will be used by civil protection and school authorities to improve their preparedness and implementation.

Funding Bodies
British Council (Newton Fund Grant Agreement Institutional Links)
Philippines’s Commission on Higher Education (CHED)

 

Post written by Bindra Thusu

UCL Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction (IRDR), UCL Humanitarian Institute and Institute of Energy Research and Training (IERT), Department of Geology, University of Jammu in India have been engaged since 2016 in the UN Sustainable Development Goals initiative showcasing collaborative research and outreach activities between the United Kingdom and India. Turtuk, a remote township in Ladakh, has been the focus of such engagement between IRDR-IERT research teams since July 2017.

Several workshops on flash floods in high altitude areas, safer schools and hospitals and a student outreach programme on Risk and Disaster reduction were conducted in Turtuk Town in July 2017. One of the flagship workshops focussed on developing a roadmap for safer and sustainable Turtuk Township, which would serve as a working model for sustainable development in a disaster prone part of Himalaya. The active participation of the local community residents with the IRDR-IERT research teams in the workshop was a landmark achievement resulting in the generation of a robust dataset which is now in the final stages of compilation at UCL for publication and dissemination to the workshop participants and residents in Turtuk.

The purpose of the October 2018 visit was twofold. Firstly, to appraise Turtuk workshop participants on the progress made in connection with the report on Turtuk Township model for safe and sustainable development and secondly, to donate medical supplies for patient care in the local hospital.

A formal meeting with the workshop delegates and local Namardars (local community leaders) took place on 27^th October. A summary progress report was presented and discussed. The concern of the community representatives was that Turtuk is a remote and isolated township that received little attention from the state administration outside the Nubra Valley and that the onus lies on the community members to follow the guidelines recommended for project implementation. Isolation from Leh and the outside world for 4-5 months in a year adds to the challenges for the community for developing schemes for safe and sustainable development.

A collective suggestion was made to conduct a follow-up workshop in early July 2019 with the participation of workshop delegates from the 2017 session. The workshop would aim to present and discuss the proposed Turtuk Model and propose a workable road map for implementation and identify challenges for success. Namardars and the 2017 Turtuk workshop participants agreed to send a formal invitation letter to all stakeholders for participation in the workshop.

The much needed wheel chairs for patient mobility were presented to the hospital on behalf of IRDR/IERT and the Aash Foundation, an officially registered NGO in the Jammu and Kashmir State. The request for wheel chairs and the other medical items was made during 2017 visit.

It is pertinent to mention that in all isolated villages and towns in India, it is quite customary to receive requests for genuine medical needs or items related to medical and emergencies related to natural disasters. Many of these requests fall within the category of risk reduction in medical and other emergencies. In this regard the medical staff at Turtuk mentioned the lack of equipment for uric acid analysis, hydraulically controlled delivery table in the maternity ward and a dental chair with scaling and X-ray unit. Raised Uric Acid levels are common in Turtuk residents, especially in winter months when consumption of meat remains high due to non-availability of fresh produce. The nearest laboratory for blood analysis is in Diskit, which is about 120 Km from Turtuk and the road to Diskit is often blocked for travel due to frequent landslides in winter months.

Although attention on the above-mentioned issues are not directly related to our research mission or project purpose, it is difficult to separate the two. In an earlier workshop conducted by NERC on 4-5 September 2017 in London on Sustainable Development Goals Interactions, the role of NGOs was highlighted for the Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF). Based on our engagement in Turtuk , the role of NGOs should be embedded with the high quality research that GCRF is expecting from academia. A charitable agency (NGO) from the UK with presence in India would be a desirable addition with the Turtuk project team from the very start of the current engagement. The NGO delegate would then have been better placed to handle assistance requests made to us for the patient care in the local hospital.

Namardars and workshop delegates expressed their appreciation and look forward to further interaction with the IRDR/IERT teams in 2019.

To address the aspirations of the Turtuk community for a follow-up workshop and outreach activities programme IRDR/IERT teams will be back in Turuk in July 2019.