By Bruce Cochrane.
The Chair of the OIE Ad Hoc Committee on Disasters says action is needed to help those who respond to disasters involving animals deal with the long term psychological effects.
"Human and Animal Welfare in Disasters-A One Welfare Approach" was discussed as part of the International One Welfare Conference last week in Winnipeg.
Dr. Gary Vroegindewey, the Chair of the OIE Ad Hoc Committee on Disasters, says disasters involving animals can be caused by everything from weather to earthquakes to long term drought to transboundary diseases.
Dr. Gary Vroegindewey-OIE Ad Hoc Committee on Disasters:
For a long time there have not been very many studies in terms of the responders for animal related diseases but, following the outbreak of Foot and Mouth Disease in the United Kingdom where we see images of animals being burned, tens of thousands of animals being killed, we know both on the community level, the producer level and at the responder level that there were longer term impacts.
Some follow up studies from that with Foot and Mouth Disease in the Netherlands and also in Japan that we saw there were behavioral health flashbacks or stresses that occurred for the responders even six years after the event occurred.
We're starting to develop an understanding that these events can cause psychological traumatic stress for the responders as well as the livestock owners, producers and the community.
We don't have great in depth information on this.
These studies are arising out of fairly recent events and so this is part of our questions that we need to evaluate in research as we go forward.
Dr. Vroegindewey says the fact that we have more of these disaster events involving larger numbers of people is fueling the realization that we need standardized training and supports that will both avoid and mitigate these effects.
Source: Farmscape