The world can learn from the turnaround of the Philippines' disaster awareness as shown by its experiences with super Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) in 2013 and Typhoon Ruby (Hagupit) in 2014, a US surgeon who took part in the response to both disasters, said.

Michael Karch, a surgeon with Mammoth Hospital in Mammoth Lakes, California, said learning lessons from Yolanda and applying them during Ruby may have saved the lives of some 1.7 million Filipinos.

"The preemptive actions of the Philippine government, military, medical, and civilian sectors should serve as valuable lessons for the rest of the world as we collectively begin to embrace mass casualty education and preparedness on an individual, national, and international platform," Karch said in a blog post.

Yolanda, which tore through the Visayas on Nov. 8, 2013, left more than 6,300 dead.

In contrast, Ruby - which, like Yolanda, packed powerful winds and posed a major threat - resulted in 18 deaths. The lower casualty count was in part due to massive evacuations in areas Ruby was projected to hit.

Karch said Yolanda's destruction had been described as the "Night of 1,000 Knives,” due to the flying debris that "wreaked injury and death on the Filipino population."

In contrast, he said, Ruby could be dubbed the "Night of a Million and a Half Flames" referring to 1.7 million plus people who survived the typhoon.

"Widespread public health and civil defense measures that had been established in the interim between Haiyan and Hagupit were initiated in the days before landfall," he said.

Karch, who said he served as a team leader in Civilian Mobile Forward Surgical Teams (CMFSTs) in the aftermath of both typhoons, found certain patterns that he said are reproducible.

"Valuable lessons can be taken from each and applied to the next. The initial differences between the disaster response to Typhoons Haiyan versus Hagupit are striking. The simple fact that the Philippine government was able to evacuate more than a million and a half million citizens out of harm's way is a testament to their dedication to learn and evolve as super storms occur on a more frequent basis," he said.

"Although the response to Hagupit was not perfect, it was much improved from that of Haiyan. The use of progressive communication through social media and Short Message Service (SMS) texting played a large role in this success," he added.

Karch likened the turnaround to super storms Katrina in 2005 and Sandy in 2013 in the US.

"As with Haiyan, the Hurricane Katrina experience was a glaring low point in terms of public opinion and confidence in governmental response to natural disaster. The government response to Hurricane Sandy showed marked improvement in pre-emptive planning and execution on the part of federal, state and city government," he said.

"The recent Philippine Hagupit experience provides us with another opportunity to learn. Although no system is perfect, if the motivation to continually improve our national disaster response is a driving force, we must study all storms, especially those with successful outcomes, and determine how we can apply these lessons to our own public health and disaster preparedness programs," he added

taken from: http://www.gmanetwork.com

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Claude Enrico survived the earthquake that hit Haiti five years ago and helped pull people from under the rubble in the flattened capital Port-au-Prince.

Now he is dedicated to saving more lives in the disaster-prone Caribbean country.

Lying on two fault lines and in the path of hurricanes, Haiti is among the countries most at risk from natural disasters in the world, including floods, tsunamis and drought.

The 7.0-magnitude earthquake on Jan. 12, 2010, which killed more than 220,000 people, was a wake-up call to the government and international aid agencies about the dire need to protect Haitians from disasters and build resilience among communities to withstand shocks.

"We have to learn to live with natural phenomena," said Enrico, 37, a civil protection officer with Haiti's interior ministry. "It's inevitable they will come year after year. So we must train people what to do in an emergency and ensure families have an evacuation plan."

NETWORK OF VOLUNTEERS

He belongs to a network of 3,000 newly trained volunteers and paid staff, created in the aftermath of the earthquake, who work across Haiti's 10 provinces.

Trained in first aid and emergency response, they are on the frontline of government efforts to ensure Haiti is better prepared to deal with disasters and can save more lives.

"We still lack equipment, firefighters and more people need to be trained. But communities are more aware about how to keep safe. One of our key messages is to tell people not to cross rivers during a flood because that's often how people get killed," said Enrico at the National Emergency Operations Centre (COUN) in downtown Port-au-Prince.

Built in 2010 following the earthquake, the center is where government ministries and aid agencies meet to coordinate disaster response. The center, which includes a warehouse stocked with water, mattresses, hygiene and food kits, has been put to the test.

A cholera epidemic broke out in October 2010, which has claimed the lives of more than 9,000 people, followed by several tropical storms, including Hurricane Sandy, which killed 54 and forced 100,000 Haitians to evacuate their homes in 2012.

"In Haiti, it's the back-to-back accumulation and combination of disasters that puts pressure on the government and the people," said Thomas Pitaud, chief technical advisor to the government on national disaster risk management systems.

Each year in parts of Haiti, homes and animals are washed away, fields inundated, and food crops and grazing land destroyed by storms and floods, pushing up food prices.

With 60 percent of Haiti's population of 10 million living on less than $2 a day, even a small increase in food prices can mean families cannot afford to put enough food on the table.

DISASTER PREPAREDNESS

Five years after the earthquake, aid agencies say progress has been made in preparing communities on what to do when a disaster strikes, including early warning systems, simulation exercises and identifying shelters.

Other projects include building flood walls and drainage ditches, along with embankment and watershed protection projects to conserve water supplies and lessen the impact of floods and landslides.

But such schemes, along with the efforts of Haitians like Enrico, can only go so far to reduce the high exposure to disasters Haiti faces.

Far less progress has been made on reducing the risk of disasters in the first place, and ensure all new homes, hospitals and schools being built are earthquake resistant.

"You have an environment that's very degraded," said Pitaud, who also works for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Haiti.

"We're constantly responding from one catastrophe to another, so it's difficult to focus on reducing risk over the long-term and get funding."

URBAN SLUMS

A lack of urban planning and high levels of urbanization have led to more than 60 percent of Haitians living in densely populated slums in Port-au-Prince, which magnifies the damage and number of casualties disasters bring.

Angelique Hilaire lives with her three children in a gray brick one-room home perched precariously on a hillside slum.

Hilaire is only too well aware that she is exposed to flooding and landslides but has no option but to brace herself for the yearly hurricane season.

"I can't afford to rent anywhere else," she said. "Every time it rains I pray to God for it to stop. But what can I do?

Even a short downpour can leave the capital flooded as piles of rubbish on the streets and debris filled canals block drains, which exacerbates flooding.

Natural disasters linked to climate change will only get more frequent and extreme in the future, experts say.

Decades of deforestation have left Haiti even more exposed to natural disasters, with less than three percent of its original forest cover still intact, according to the UNDP.

This causes soil erosion and reduces the ability of soil to retain water, making Haiti more vulnerable to flooding and landslides. During heavy rainfall, there are few trees to stop water washing down the bare mountains.

While 5.5 million tree seedlings have been planted in Haiti by the UNDP since 2010, not enough has been done to stop people cutting down trees in the first place.

Selling charcoal, which comes from burning wood, is used for cooking and is a key source of income for many Haitians living in the countryside.  

"One challenge is to provide economic opportunities so farmers don't have to cut down trees," Pitaud said.