Last year was a record-breaking year for disasters. The United States experienced three major hurricanes, out-of-control wildfires, flooding, mudslides and two of the deadliest mass shootings to date, with many lives lost and billions of dollars in damage.
Curt Harris, associate director of UGA’s Institute for Disaster Management in the College of Public Health, wants to train more people in how to help in such situations, since friends and neighbors sometimes are in a better position to react than emergency personnel.
Harris and his co-authors propose adding a universal disaster-response training and education curriculum to existing first aid courses in high schools.
“We’re not looking to reinvent the wheel, but for someone to understand how to open up an airway, how to stop a bleed—these are things that we know to be lifesaving,” he says. “Whether it’s a tornado, a shooter or a bombing event is irrelevant. These are the interventions that save people’s lives.”
Last year was a record-breaking year for disasters. The United States experienced three major hurricanes, out-of-control wildfires, flooding, mudslides and two of the deadliest mass shootings to date, with many lives lost and billions of dollars in damage.
This brief appeared in the fall 2018 issue of Research Magazine. The original press release is available at https://news.uga.edu/expert-makes-case-new-disaster-training/.
