Carolina School of Public Health Response
To Hurricane Katrina Disaster

To: the faculty, students, staff, alumni and friends of our School
From: Dean Barbara K. Rimer

This is a brief update on what we’re doing to help people dislocated by Hurricane Katrina. The response from so many people in the School of Public Health and our alumni has been wonderful. We are welcoming public health students from Tulane University, and trying to make room for more; providing technical assistance to the Centers for Disease Control, NIEHS and other organizations about disaster management; raising cash for the American Red Cross; organizing volunteers to help in affected areas when help is requested (e.g. our Team Epi Aid is ready to go); just to name a few things our School is doing. Click for details.

We know there is still much to do. We had a taste of the destruction and devastation of hurricane-induced flooding, along with the months and years of recovery time, when Hurricane Floyd hit eastern North Carolina in 1999. Our faculty and students have expertise that others are now depending on as communities in Louisiana and Mississippi face the worst of the devastation. Below are links to some of this research:

Disaster Down East: Using Participatory Action Research to Explore Intimate Partner Violence in Eastern North Carolina

After Hurricane Floyd Passed: Investigating the Social Determinants of Disaster
Preparedness and Recovery

There are some things you can do immediately:

• In what I know is typical Carolina School of Public Health style, please welcome students, Humphrey Fellows and faculty here from Tulane University. They’ve been through a traumatic and devastating time and can use our support and encouragement. I really want to commend Janet Porter, Peggy Bentley, Gretchen Van Vliet, Jen Horney and leaders of the student-run global health committee for their generosity, creativity and dogged persistence in getting these people here. Peggy Leatt, Aundra Shields, Ed Baker, Sherry Rhodes and others have been tireless as well. I had the chance to meet the fellows soon after they arrived. I am so sorry about the circumstances that brought them here but was so impressed by their backgrounds, ability to smile in the face of terrible adversity and their obvious public health skills. I am certain that they and we both will benefit from their presence at UNC.
• Check out the link on this page called Ways You Can Help to decide how you can make a difference – by donating money, offering time and/or expertise, giving blood, sharing your home or offering whatever you can to help others during this terrible time. Many community organizations and religious groups are engaged in helping. Find the way to help that works for you.
• Offer support to the faculty, staff and students who have colleagues, friends and relatives who have been affected by the hurricane. It must be especially difficult for those who cannot find these people and do not know their fate.
• Students who want to talk with someone can find help at the University Counseling and Psychological Services. We will be posting other resources on the SPH website, and the UNC website is providing up-to-date information.
• Ed Fisher, our new chair of Health Behavior and Health Education and a clinical psychologist, has offered to hold another open forum if people would like a chance to talk.

It has been observed that public health is taken for granted except when the public’s health is threatened. Well, once again, public health is a visible presence, and we at Carolina are going to do all we can to make a difference. I hope that when this is over—and that may be a long time from now--we will do some introspection about what we need to know and do as individuals, a school and society to be better prepared for the next disaster. Never has it been more clear that public health is global health, and that we have much to learn from our global health specialists about how to respond to this tragedy. See some of the recent articles about the aftermath of the tsunami.

We will continue to update our website as we have new information about our involvement and response. Thanks to Ramona DuBose, Emily Smith, Will Foushee, Dave Butts and Chris Ogden for creating a webpage for the Hurricane Katrina aftermath in record time. Please send any updates or additional information to Ramona (rjdubose@unc.edu) or Emily (ejsmith@unc.edu).

For information on our campus-wide responses, please see http://www.unc.edu/cps/katrina.html