ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Some disasters, such as earthquake and flood make the majority of affected people homeless. The accommodation of these people in temporary shelters and camps requires some specific ethical issues. The aim of the present study was to discuss ethical issues regarding living in camps following natural disasters. METHODS: This study is conducted utilizinga qualitative content analysis approach. The required data were collected from four Focus Group Discussions (FGDs). Subsequently, 11 in-depth interviews were completed using the individuals who had the experience of receiving care following natural disasters and continued until data saturation. Data were analyzed using Graham content analysis method. RESULTS: According to the results obtained from affected people's views, the most important ethical issues that are not considered important in temporary shelters and camps include:1) the violation of privacy,2) the shortage of basic needs (e.g., food, water, and sanitation) and type and quality of services rendered,3) lack of attention to cultural and religious views of the affected people, 4) cause of evacuation, 5)lack of co-operation among disaster managers, 6)respecting the properties of the affected people, 7)conditions and geographic location of camps, 8)property care, and 9)community-based care. CONCLUSION: Without paying attention to ethical issues, living in temporary shelters (i.e., camps) violates the dignity of affected people and then the affected people will not have appropriate cooperation with the managers. All these issues expose them to more harm than before.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Industrialization could bring risk of Technological Disaster (TD) such as happened in Chernobyl, Bhopal and Fukushima crisis. Little has been discussed about its related ethical issues. In this study, we aimed to investigate ethical issues have been stated for technological disasters. METHODS: A systematic search was conducted on the main international literature databases including Pubmed, Embase, Scopus and ISI (Jan 1, 2000 to Jan 1, 2018). From 64articles were eligible for investigation of ethical issues in Natural disaster, 6 was related to Technological Disaster. The articles were in English language. RESULTS: Our result show that there are seven articles discussing ethical issues during Technological disaster. All of them are related to nuclear crisis in Fukushima resulting from Japan tsunami 2011. These articles discussed mainly three ethical issues in providing medical care to victims of Technological Disasters as follow: 1- Duty of care 2- Mandatory evacuationand3- Resource Allocation. CONCLUSION: Victim health is the main factor for making decision and implementation of any programs during response to disasters. Mandatory Evacuation for reasons other than providing health to people (such as: maintain public order) and if bring health risk to people will be unjustified. Duty of health workers for providing care is based on General beneficence meanwhile it is necessary to provide facilities to protect them from dangers that treat them in the field. For act ethically, Health workers must have adequate preparedness for response to T-D meanwhile it is necessary to provide guidelines for individuals that participation in relief operation. It is necessary to discuss more about Technological Disaster Ethics especially in industrial countries and where there is especial industrial with potential of huge crises.
