Emergency and disaster response

There are typically four phases in an emergency response cycle:

1. Mitigation: Taking proactive steps to identify, prevent, eliminate and minimize exposure and impact of disasters and/or emergencies.
2. Preparedness: Taking action to plan and prepare for potential disasters and/or emergencies in the response and recovery phases. This may include, but is not limited to, training exercises among responders, public education, personnel management, and continuity planning.
3. Response: Taking action to directly respond to the disaster and/or emergency, with the objectives, in order, to limit loss of life, minimize suffering and injury, and reduce property damage.
4. Recovery: Taking action to repair and restore conditions to acceptable levels, when feasible, after a disaster and/or emergency event. This may include, but is not limited to, return of evacuees, providing psychological support, reopening/resuming of impacted businesses, offer of financial assistance, after-action reviews, and reconstruction.

Northern Health’s environmental public health team collaboratively works with others agencies, departments, and local governments throughout the stages of the emergency response cycle, at varying capacities.