Spirituality/Medicine Interface Project

A Decade of Disasters: Lessons from the Indian Experience

Authors: Sekar Kasi, PhD, Subhasis Bhadra, MPhil, PhD, Allen R. Dyer, MD, PhD

Abstract

Over the past decade, India and the United States of America have experienced a number of traumatic mass disasters that have tested their resources in responding to the needs of individuals in distress, survivors, and communities. India experienced sectarian riots in the state of Gujarat in 2002; a massive and unprecedented tsunami on December 26, 2004, which killed some 10,000 persons along the Tamil Nadu coast from Nagaputanim to Chennai; and, more recently, a series of earthquakes in Kashmir. The United States has been traumatized by terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon (the second and third attacks on the World Trade Center) on September 11, 2001, and a series of massive storm events, most notably Hurricane Katrina on August 28, 2005. Disasters, both natural and man-made, defy prediction but can be anticipated.

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