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Primary care in disasters: opportunity to address a hidden burden of health care
Author(s) -
Burns Penelope L,
Douglas Kirsty A,
Hu Wendy
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
medical journal of australia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.904
H-Index - 131
eISSN - 1326-5377
pISSN - 0025-729X
DOI - 10.5694/mja2.50067
Subject(s) - citation , library science , primary care , history , national library , medicine , family medicine , computer science
In Australia, “a land ... of droughts and flooding rains,”1 disasters affect our lives annually, the majority of which are weatherrelated.2 They are a part of the landscape, taking the form of cyclones, floods, bushfires, droughts and other phenomena. Cyclone Debbie, which hit northern Queensland in 2017, the Tathra bushfires, which affected the south coast of New South Wales in 2018, and the thunderstorm asthma event in Melbourne in 2016 are just a few recent examples. Such catastrophic events affect rural and urban communities and coastal and inland locations. No community in Australia is exempt, which is reflected in the recent shift in focus by national and international disaster management policy to prioritise improving local community capacity to respond and recover.3,4