Study finds repeated exposure to natural disasters has long-term mental health impacts

ANI |
Updated: January 15, 2022 13:39 IST

Texas [US]January 15 (ANI): According to recent research, repeated exposure to major disasters does not make people mentally stronger and leads to long-term mental health problems.
The study has been published in the ‘Natural Hazards Journal’.
“We discovered the reverse of the adage ‘what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger,'” said the study’s lead author, Garett Sansom, a research assistant professor in the Department of Occupational and Environmental Health at the School of Public Health.
Sansom and a team of researchers from Texas A&M studied people in the Houston area, which is susceptible to hurricanes and floods, as well as industrial emergencies.
Between 2000 and 2020, Texas, one of the states most prone to natural disasters, experienced 33 major disasters declared by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Many of these, hurricanes, winter weather, droughts and floods, affected the Houston area. The area has also been affected by emergencies such as explosions and chemical releases at nearby industrial facilities.
According to the research team, the combination of natural disasters and industrial facility emergencies presented a unique opportunity to observe impacts.
“There is an unfortunate truth that many communities that reside along the Gulf Coast are at the nexus of exposure to natural and anthropogenic, or man-made, hazards,” Sansom said.

The team used a short 12-item health survey to collect information. The survey evaluated the cumulative impacts of exposure to assess changes over time, producing a composite score for mental (MCS) and physical (PCS) health.
Most of the respondents reported that they experienced many dangerous events in the last five years. Hurricanes and floods (96.35%) were the most experienced events, followed by industrial fires (96.08), chemical spills (86.84) and tornadoes (79.82).
The team found that when people experienced two or more events in the past five years, their MCS averages fell below expected national levels.
“Mental health is often overlooked when responding to and preparing for exposure to hazards,” Sansom said.
“However, to achieve community resilience efforts, mental conditions must be taken into account,” he added.
The study results helped reveal the long-term mental impact hazards can have. More importantly, they underscored the need for targeted public health interventions for these individuals, as well as the communities in which they resided.
Sansom’s coauthors included Courtney Thompson and Lindsay Sansom, both from the Department of Geography at Texas A&M University, Leanne Fawkes, a graduate research assistant in Occupational and Environmental Health, and Elizabeth Boerlin, a doctoral student in Occupational Health and Safety. (AND ME)