ncfpd.umn.edu - April 4, 2014

Webinar - Community Resilience and Impacts of Interdependent Infrastructure Disruptions as Experienced from Hurricane Sandy (One hour long)

Presented By: 
Michael D. McDonald, Dr.P.H.
Chairman, Global Resilience Inititatives
Executive Director, Health Initiatives Foundation, Inc. 

Facilitated By:
John T. Hoffman, Col., USA, Ret.
Senior Research Fellow, National Center for Food Protection and Defense

Under the dynamic conditions of rapid climate change and broader global changes, resilience and sustainability are not being achieved through traditional emergency management and humanitarian approaches alone. While community-based resilience networks are now beginning to emerge in a race to stabilize New York City's coastal communities significantly impacted by Superstorm Sandy in 2012, many impacted neighborhoods are still trending toward greater vulnerability plaguing recovery and preparedness for the next wave of potentially larger storms.

The number of homeless students in public preschools, elementary schools, middle schools and high schools is at an all-time high.  Photo: John Moore/Getty Images

CLICK HERE - Department of Education
Education for Homeless Children and Youths Program - Data Collection Summary (34 page .PDF report)

truth-out.org - by Crystal Shepeard - November 3, 2013

. . . For many students, when they go to school each morning, they may have no idea where they will be sleeping that night.

The Department of Education released its latest report on homeless students last month and the numbers are startling. More than 1.2 million K–12 students for the 2011-12 school year were homeless.

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ALSO SEE RELATED ARTICLES IN THE LINKS BELOW:

Student homelessness hits record high

Image: Senator Mary Landrieu, of Louisiana. Photograph: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP

theguardian.co.uk - May 1st, 2014 - Suzanne Goldenberg

Barack Obama faced a new challenge on the controversial Keystone XL pipeline on Thursday when Democrats and Republicans in the Senate introduced a bill taking the decision out of his hands.

The bill, introduced by Louisiana Democrat Mary Landrieu and North Dakota Republican John Hoeven, would bypass Obama, authorising immediate construction of the 1,660-mile pipeline.

The two senators said they were hoping for a vote as early as next week. Landrieu said she hoped to “greenlight construction of the pipeline immediately”.

(VIEW COMPLETE ARTICLE)

Image: The tin-based perovskite layer acts as an efficient sunlight absorber that is sandwiched between two electric charge transport layers for conducting electricity to the outside world.

economictimes.indiatimes.com - May 5th, 2014 - Mercouri G. Kanatzidis

In a breakthrough, scientists have developed a new low cost, efficient and environment-friendly solar cell that uses tin instead of the hazardous lead.

Researchers from Northwestern University are among the first to create a solar cell that uses a structure called perovskite, with tin as the light-absorbing material instead of lead.

"Exculding the use of lead is a quantum leap in the process of creating a very promising type of solar cell called a perovskite," said Mercouri G Kanatzidis, an inorganic chemist with expertise in dealing with tin.

Modifiable risk factors could help combat scourges like heart disease, cancer, CDC says

webmd.com - by Dennis Thompson

THURSDAY, May 1, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- People in the southeastern United States have a much greater risk of dying early from any of the nation's five leading causes of death, federal health officials reported Thursday.

Those living in eight southern states -- Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee -- endure 28 percent to 33 percent of all potentially preventable deaths from heart disease, cancer, chronic lower respiratory disease, stroke and unintentional injury, according to U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates.

"This data is yet another demonstration that when it comes to health in this country, your longevity and health are more determined by your ZIP code than they are by your genetic code," CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden said during a news conference.

huffingtonpost.com - by Claire O'Connor - May 3, 2014

Matt Russell has seen strange weather before. As a fifth-generation Iowa farmer, he’s used to being at the whims of the skies. But ominous changes are underway at his Coyote Run Farm, and lately, he’s been trying to cope with “the wrong weather at the wrong time.”

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submitted by John Carroll

As the chikungunya virus spreads through the Caribbean islands, travelers and even U.S. residents need to take precautions.

healthline.com - by Dana K. Cassell - May 7, 2014

Chikungunya (pronounced chik-en-gun-ye) is a viral disease transmitted to humans by the bites of infected Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus mosquitoes, which are found across the globe. .

. . . Originally believed to be a “tropical” disease, experts were surprised when an outbreak occurred in northeastern Italy in 2007. Now it has spread farther—to 14 Caribbean island countries since it was first detected on the island of St. Martin in December 2013.

Mosquitoes May Spread the Virus to the Southeastern U.S.

Because the Caribbean islands are close to the U.S., there is some concern that chikungunya will spread to the U.S., perhaps via Florida.

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CLICK HERE - CDC - Chikungunya in the Americas

A colorized photo of the MERS coronavirus, or MERS-CoV. Health officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have confirmed the first case of Middle East respiratory syndrome in the United States, in Indiana. (National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases)

latimes.com - by Amina Khan - May 2, 2014

A case of the sometimes fatal Middle East respiratory syndrome, or MERS, has been reported in Indiana, officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday.

The announcement marks the first time a patient with the infection has been identified in the United States, CDC officials said.

“CDC is working closely with the Indiana State Health Department and hospital to rapidly respond to and investigate this situation to help prevent the spread of the virus,” Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said in a news briefing.

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A deluge last week destroyed a section of the Scenic Highway in Pensacola, Fla. Credit Brantly S. Keiek, via Associated Press

GlobalChange.gov

nytimes.com - by Justin Gillis - May 6, 2014

The effects of human-induced climate change are being felt in every corner of the United States, scientists reported Tuesday, with water growing scarcer in dry regions, torrential rains increasing in wet regions, heat waves becoming more common and more severe, wildfires growing worse, and forests dying under assault from heat-loving insects. . .

. . . “Climate change, once considered an issue for a distant future, has moved firmly into the present,” the scientists declared in a major new report assessing the situation in the United States.

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CLICK HERE - REPORT - Climate Change Impacts in the United States - U.S. National Climate Assessment

nytimes.com - by Sheri Fink - October 27, 2013

WHEN the floodwaters rose around New Orleans hospitals after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, doctors wondered whom to rescue first. Sick babies? Critically ill adults? The elderly?

More than seven years later, as Hurricane Sandy hit New York City, Bellevue Hospital’s basement filled with millions of gallons of floodwater from the East River. The physician heading the intensive care unit was told that most backup power was likely to fail. She would have six power outlets. Which of her 50 patients should get one?

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Florida - State Emergency Response Team - Situation Report No. 3
SPRING 2014 FLOODING UPDATE: Friday, May 02, 2014, 12:00 p.m.
(4 page .PDF report)
http://www.floridadisaster.org/eoc/PressReleases/
05%2002%2014%20SitRep.pdf

Additional Situation Reports and Press Releases (see Right sidebar)
http://www.floridadisaster.org/NewsMedia.asp

Facebook page - Florida Severe Weather Alerts & Disaster Resources
https://www.facebook.com/
floridasevereweatherdisasterresources

MSU student-athletes set up a tornado relief shelter on Tuesday. (PHOTO CREDIT: Megan Bean)

hailstate.com - April 30, 2014

STARKVILLE, Miss. -- A day after destructive tornadoes swept through the state of Mississippi, Mississippi State student-athletes from all sports responded as volunteers in the relief efforts.

MSU student-athletes, graduate assistants, athletic department staff, weight room staff and equipment staff quickly set up a tornado relief center and shelter in the parking lot of the Palmeiro Center on the MSU campus. The relief center is being coordinated by the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.

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(ALSO SEE RELATED ARTICLE HERE)

Photo - @TWCBreaking

nbcnews.com - By Alastair Jamieson and M. Alex Johnson - April 30, 2014

Torrential rainfall and “life-threatening" flooding turned deadly in Florida’s panhandle late Tuesday - the latest fallout from a monster weather system that has killed at least 35 people in six states. . .

. . . More than two feet of rain fell in a 26-hour period in Pensacola, Fla. according to one rain gauge, washing away bridges and closing mile after mile of highways across the region, leaving hundreds of drivers stranded for hours. . .

. . . More than five inches fell on Pensacola in the single hour between 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. CT (10 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET) Tuesday, the NWS said.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

(THE U.S. RESILIENCE SYSTEM IS ASSISTING WITH RELIEF EFFORTS FOR THIS DISASTER THROUGH THE ADMINISTRATION OF A FACEBOOK PAGE TITLED "Mississippi Severe Weather Alerts & Disaster Resources".
CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE "Mississippi Severe Weather Alerts & Disaster Resources" FACEBOOK PAGE.)

Mississippi Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) - News

FEMA - Resources - Mississippi - DR-4175

(THE U.S. RESILIENCE SYSTEM IS ASSISTING WITH RELIEF EFFORTS FOR THIS DISASTER THROUGH THE ADMINISTRATION OF A FACEBOOK PAGE TITLED "Alabama Severe Weather Alerts & Disaster Resources".
CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE "Alabama Severe Weather Alerts & Disaster Resources" FACEBOOK PAGE.)

State of Alabama - Emergency Management - Situation Reports

Alabama Emergency Management Agency