Emergency preparedness includes protecting physical safety, maintaining human connection, meeting practical needs, respecting people’s choices, and supporting those who witness and respond to suffering. Communities can reduce some of the harm associated with emergencies by making dependable relationships and mutual assistance part of their preparation.
After an emergency, our task is to help people feel safe, rather than telling them they should feel safe. They may be facing real danger, uncertainty, inaccessible services, physical pain, or the loss of people and places they depend on. A trauma-aware response takes those circumstances seriously instead of treating distress as an individual problem to be corrected. It also considers answers to these questions:
Who checks on older or disabled neighbors?
Who has transportation?
Who can help someone whose home is damaged?
Who notices when a volunteer has been working for days without rest?
Who makes sure people who are disabled, isolated, or economically disadvantaged aren’t left out of preparedness plans?
People need more than to cope individually; we need relationships and responses to the conditions under which we live.
➡️ For the full scoop on trauma-informed emergency preparedness from an Interpersonal Neurobiology lens, including our 12-page booklet, “Trauma-Aware Emergency Preparedness: A Community Handbook,” at www.TraumaAwareAmerica.org/emergency-preparedness
