Conventional wisdom holds that pre-event planning is a key factor in effective disaster response. In assessing the response to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, it is necessary to evaluate the extent to which emergency management agencies were prepared to respond to a pandemic, particularly given the unusual nature of this event, ie, scope, scale, and length of response. While emergency management agencies at every level of government have been involved in the COVID-19 response, state-level governments have taken on a prominent and atypical lead-ership role.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMajor disasters often displace populations, requiring coordinated response efforts from governmental and voluntary organizations to support and assist an influx of evacuees. Despite the frequency and significance of this occurrence, this aspect of disaster management has received limited scholarly attention, with research predominantly focusing on response and recovery at the impacted disaster sites. This study investigates disaster management and support offered to Puerto Rican evacuees arriving in Central Florida after Hurricane Maria.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMajor disasters often displace populations, requiring coordinated response efforts from governmental and voluntary organizations to support and assist an influx of evacuees. Despite the frequency and significance of this occurrence, this aspect of disaster management has received limited scholarly attention, with research predominantly focusing on response and recovery at the impacted disaster sites. This study investigates disaster management and support offered to Puerto Rican evacuees arriving in Central Florida after Hurricane Maria.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFProtective policies have been unequally and inconsistently applied in the United States throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. This study investigates the relationship between state and local policies and Covid-19 deaths, combining three datasets: the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Social Vulnerability Index; local laws and regulations from the COVID Analysis and Mapping of Policies (AMP) database; and Covid-19 deaths by county reported by The New York Times. It examines, using propensity score matching, local policies and regulations as treatments during the crisis, and assesses how, inter alia, face mask requirements, gathering restrictions, stay-at-home orders, and social distancing mandates enacted at the county level altered Covid-19 deaths.
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