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Special Issue on Children and Disasters
Lori Peek, Guest Editor
The number
of natural disasters recorded globally has increased fourfold over the past
three decades, growing from fewer than 100 in 1975 to more than 400 in
2005. Most scientists agree that economic losses and fatalities caused by
disasters will continue to rise over the twenty-first century, and children
are among those most at risk for death, injury, and trauma. Indeed, several
recent catastrophes, including the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, the 2005
Pakistan earthquake, and 2005’s Hurricane Katrina, brought into sharp
relief the pain that disasters may cause for the youngest victims.
Researchers estimate that the tsunami claimed the lives of as many as 60,000
children, the Pakistan earthquake resulted in 18,000 child fatalities and
destroyed 10,000 schools, and Katrina displaced over 160,000 children from
the city of New Orleans. A recent report by Save the Children estimates
that by the second decade of the twenty-first century, up to 175 million
children will be affected each year by climate-related disasters alone.
A new issue
of the journal Children, Youth and
Environments explores the vulnerability and resilience of children in
disasters. The issue contains a unique collection of 20 papers from around
the world, an annotated resource list, five book reviews, and one media
report. The papers examine children’s reactions to drought, tsunamis,
hurricanes, volcanic eruptions, climate change, and the HIV/AIDS pandemic.
Some of the contributions also consider the experiences of children who
live in a constant state of disaster as a result of chronic poverty,
violence, or unsafe living conditions.
Contributors
from a variety of disciplines explore a number of topics, including children’s
risk for illness, injury, and death in disaster, psychological effects of
traumatic events, negative educational impacts, and the effects of
post-disaster displacement on health and well-being. Authors also examine
post-disaster child protection responses in the United States and in
international contexts, the importance of family and school support, and
the need for post-disaster child care. Some of the papers focus
specifically on children as active agents and the roles that they may play
in terms of communicating risk, engaging in household and community
preparedness activities, and participating in post-disaster rebuilding
efforts.
With
disaster risk on the rise worldwide, this special issue highlights the
critical importance of focusing scholarly and applied attention on the
special vulnerabilities of children, while also working to understand how
children can contribute to disaster preparedness, response, and recovery
initiatives.
Children, Youth and Environments is
an on-line journal published by the University of Colorado-Boulder. Check http://www.colorado.edu/journals/cye/
for a full listing of papers and other resources that appear in the special
issue on Children and Disasters (volume 18, number 1).
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