DFID
Partnership and Impact
Project: The Meaning of Health Security
for Disaster Resilience in Bangladesh
Dr. Andrew Collins
andrew.collins@northumbria.ac.uk
www.northumbria.ac.uk/ddc
The Meaning of Health Security for
Disaster Resilience in Bangladesh
1. Project Overview
2. Partnership and Impact
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Theoretical basis: Simplified notion of change in
health security through critical incidents
C
A
Health and
Wellbeing
Indicator
X
Y
A = Point of disaster
B = Lowest point of disaster
C = Recovery point at x years
Y = Change in (health)
indicator due to disaster
X = Rate of recovery
B
Time
Health Security in Disaster Resilience
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Pathogens
Pathways
H
V
Places
People
Politics
Perceptions
Health Ecology Approach to Health Security at
Global, Community and Individual Levels
Health Security in Disaster Resilience
4
Household based resilience building
Capabilities
Assets
Access
Outcomes:
 More income
 Improved well-being
 Reduced
vulnerability
 Improved food
security
 Sustainable use of
natural resources
H
Institutions:
Activities
Vulnerability:
 Shocks
 Trends
 Seasonality
Strategies







Government
Culture
Religion
The Market
Politics
Private Sector
Law
Adapted from DFID (2000)
5
Disaster and Development
Andrew E. Collins
Book (2009)
6
D & D Implications and Applications
Routledge Perspectives on Development
Project Rationale
Potentially:
1. Health security reduces disaster impact
2. Health security indicators facilitate
preparedness for changing risk thresholds
3. Health security enables people to be resilient
to disaster and development impacts
Health Security in Disaster Resilience
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Project Objectives
• Objective 1: Identify how health security influences
vulnerability and resilience to disasters, and explore
how health security is interpreted in terms of
disaster vulnerability.
• Objective 2: Assess how health security monitoring
can facilitate early warning and preparedness against
changing thresholds of disaster risk.
• Objective 3: Evaluate which approaches to health
security enable people to monitor resilience as an aid
to mitigating the impact of disaster events.
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Questions
Institutionally;
• What added value does health security bring to
livelihood security (DFID 1998, Care 1999) and risk
reduction frameworks? (DFID 1997, ISDR 2004, DFID
2005, 2006)
• Involves knowing how health security is interpreted
in terms of disaster vulnerability
Health Security in Disaster Resilience
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Questions – more practically
• Which health security indicators of pre-disaster preparedness and
sustainable development apply best in contexts of high risk major
incidents?
• How can people monitor health security themselves as part of self-care
for disaster resilience at local and wider levels?
• What are the circumstances within which different scales of health
security monitoring – local, sub regional, and national can facilitate early
warning of changing thresholds of disaster risk?
• What aspects of health security (i.e. infectious diseases) in Bangladesh
make people and places vulnerable or resilient to disasters?
• What is the theoretical basis for implementing an integrated infectious
disease risk and poverty reduction agenda as part of disaster risk
reduction in Bangladesh?
• How can health security (self-care HS and that provided externally) be
made more readily accessible to people through health risk management
communication and participation?
• What does it mean to mainstream health security into disaster risk
reduction?
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Applied Value
• Implications for practitioners.
• Feeding into policy on how health security can be built into the
livelihoods and disaster risk reduction frameworks.
• How risk management can be made accessible to people as part of
the poverty reduction or climate adaptation agendas.
• How people make their own assessments of vulnerability, resilience
and health risks to prevent ill health.
• Raising the profile of risk diagnostics and vulnerability
interpretation in Bangladesh and beyond.
• Communication of ideas and experiences from areas with recent
history of disasters.
• Exploring the extent to which poverty intervention strategies might
orient health security as part of disaster risk reduction.
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Combined Methodologies
• Specialist and lay perspectives
• Qualitative and quantitative
• Secondary data, questionnaires, FGDs, in
depth interviewing, household observation
• Ongoing evaluation, dissemination and
learning through doing, with communities,
practitioners policy makers and practitioners
Health Security in Disaster Resilience
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Field Sites
Domar
Matlab
Chakoria
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References
•
•
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Alam, E. and Collins, A.E. (2010) ‘Cyclone Disaster Vulnerability and Response Experiences in Coastal
Bangladesh’, Disasters, 34:4. http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/123497735/PDFSTART
Williams, L. Collins, A.E., Bauaze, A. and Edgeworth, R. (2010) ‘The role of risk perception in reducing
cholera vulnerability’, Risk Management: an International Journal, 12, pp.163-84.
Ray-Bennett, N.S., Collins, A.E., Edgeworth, R. et al. (2010 in press) ‘Promoting disaster resilient
communities through health security approach: the case of Bangladesh’, Journal of Natural Resources
Policy Research (NRPR) Special Issue on Disaster Management, Routledge.
Nahar, P. Alamgir, F., Collins, A.E., and Bhuiya, A. (2010) ‘Contextualising disaster in relation to human
health in Bangladesh’, Asian Journal of Water, Environment and Pollution, 7:1, pp.55-62.
Ray-Bennett, N., Collins, A.E., Bhuiya, A., Edgeworth, R., Nahar, P and Alamgir, F. (2010) ‘Exploring the
meaning of health security for disaster resilience through people's perspectives in Bangladesh’, Health and
Place, 16: pp.581-9. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.healthplace.2010.01.003
Nahar, P. Alamgir, F., Bhuiya, A., Ray-Bennett, N. and Collins, A.E., (2010) ‘Interrelations between water,
health and livelihood in disasters’, Text book chapter of Readers text SaciWater: South Asia Consortium for
Interdisciplinary Water Resources Studies. Delhi, Sage Publication.
Collins, A.E. (2009) ‘The people centred approach to early warning systems and the ‘Last Mile’,
International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), World Disaster Report,
Chapter 2, pp. 39-68.
Collins, A.E. (2009) Disaster and Development, Routledge Perspectives in Development Series, London.
(Book contains 29 plates, 24 figures, 17 tables and 18 boxes) http://www.routledge.com/978-0-41542668-8
Alamgir, F., Nahar, P., Collins, A.E., Shankar Ray-Bennett, N. and Bhuiya, A. (2009) ‘Climate change and food
security: health risks and vulnerability of the poor in Bangladesh’, The International Journal of Climate
Change Impacts and Responses, 1: pp.37-54. ISSN Common Ground Publishing.
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References
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Collins, A.E. (2008) ‘Climate Change and Infectious Disease Risk Reduction’, Proceedings of the UK – Asia
Scientists and Practitioners Seminar, a Pre-event of the 3rd Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk
Reduction, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 1st December.
Collins, A.E. (2008) ‘Health Security or Climate Change Adaptation? What do we really mean by Disaster
Risk Reduction in times of disease?’ Proceedings of the International Disaster and Risk Conference (IDRC),
Davos, Switzerland, August 25th – 29th, pp. 136-139.
Alam, E. and Collins, A.E. (2008) ‘Understanding Vulnerability and Local Responses to Cyclone Disasters:
Experiences from the Bangladesh Coast’, Proceedings of the International Disaster and Risk Conference
(IDRC), Davos, Switzerland, August 25th – 29th, pp. 768-770.
Manyena, S.B., Mutale, S.B. and Collins, A.E. (2008) Sustainability of rural water supply and disaster
resilience in Zimbabwe, Water Policy 10:6, pp. 563-575.
Collins, A.E., Lucas, M.E., Islam, M.S., and Williams, L.E. (2006) Socio-economic and environmental origins
of cholera epidemics in Mozambique: guidelines for tackling uncertainty in infectious disease prevention
and control, International Journal of Environmental Studies Special Issue on Africa, 63:5, pp. 537-549.
Edgeworth, R. and Collins, A.E. (2006) Self-Care as a Response to Diarrhoea in Rural Bangladesh:
Empowered Choice or Enforced Adoption? Social Science and Medicine, 63, pp. 2686-97.
Collins, A.E. (2006) Infectious disease risk management in Africa, conference paper for Epidemics and
Disasters Session of the XVI International Sociological Association (ISA) World Congress of Sociology,
Durban, South Africa, 23-29 July.
Collins, A.E. (2006) Health ecology in disaster reduction strategies: lessons from Mozambique, conference
paper and Chair for Africa Disasters Session of the XVI International Sociological Association (ISA) World
Congress of Sociology, Durban, South Africa, 23-29 July.
Collins, A.E. and Williams, L.E. (2006) Community engagement with integrated disease risk management,
Proceedings of the International Disaster Reduction Conference (IDRC), Davos, Switzerland, 27 Aug – 1
Sept, pp. 120-123.
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2. Partnership and Impact: Outline
Build on:
• Rationale
- Demand led
• Opportunity
- Clear foundation to partnership
• Continuity
- Commitment, vision, dissemination
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Rationale – demand led project
e.g)
• Offset disaster through health security
• Understand health security in terms of
resilience
• Implication and application of findings
- Bringing lay persons perspectives to bare in policy
making
- For monitoring and managing risk
- For identifying paths to capacity
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Opportunity – clear foundation to partnership
• i.e. Based on Disaster and Development
Centre (DDC) and ICDDR, Bangladesh link
• Strong theoretical basis – i.e. DRR, Livelihoods,
Health Ecology, others ...
• Applied linkages – institutional relevance
beyond the academy
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Continuity – commitment and vision
• Makes sense in the long term
• Can link widely
• Inspires dedication and investment
individually
• Can be published in a variety of outlet types
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Maximising impact
• Links to wider poverty reduction concerns
• Is likely to need an integrated approach
• Can be understood in a Government Policy
context
• Can be delivered in a wide range of subject
specialist and broader dissemination outlets
Ends.
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