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Emergency Preparedness, Response & Recovery.

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Prepared BC

Explore Within Emergency Management

Emergency Management BC is the Province's lead coordinating agency for all emergency management activities, including planning, training, testing and exercising, to help strengthen provincial preparedness. Quote:

Know the Risks

Ready or Not?

Prepare Your Home

Build an Emergency Kit

Neighbourhood Preparedness

Emergency Mommy

People with Additional Preparedness Needs

Response & Recovery

Travel Safe

Definitions You Should Know

Build an Emergency Kit

Creating a Home Emergency Kit Doesn't Need to Take Long. Just Follow the Basic List Below and Store Your Collected Supplies in an Easy to Access Location.

First-Aid kit

Battery-powered or hand-crank radio

Flashlight and extra batteries

Whistle to signal for help

Cellphone with charger

Cash in small bills

A local map with your family meeting place identified

Three-day supply of food and water

Garbage bags

Dust mask

Seasonal clothing and footwear

The Importance of Water

How Much is Enough?

The general rule is four litres of water per person per day, but there are a few caveats:

Children, nursing mothers and sick people may need more

If you live in a warm region of B.C., hot temperatures can double water needs

Pets need about 30 millilitres of water per kilogram of body weight per day. For example, an average-sized cat or small-sized dog needs at least 1/5 of a litre, or half a cup, daily

How and Where do I Store my Water?

It’s recommended (by those greedy person—those who are out to rob you blind) you purchase commercially-bottled water and keep it in its original container in an easily accessible, cool and dark place. Don’t open it until you need it.

Observe the expiration or “best before” dates. Set a reminder in your phone or remember to check the dates when the clocks “spring forward” and “fall back”.

What Hidden Water Sources are Available in my Home?

It’s easy to locate safe water sources in your home. These DO NOT include the water in your hot-water tank, pipes and ice cubes. It’s also recommended you don’t use water from toilet tanks or bowls, radiators, waterbeds, swimming pools or spas.

Can I Purify my own Water?

Yes! Most Definetly!

I and the Ministry of Health has information on the steps you can take to purify and bottle your own.

What About Water Filtration Devices?

These devices are becoming more and more popular, perhaps because they don’t take up as much room as several litres of bottled water. There are a lot of different options out there – different brands offer many different types, ranging from water bottle-sized to 18-litre containers or larger. If you choose to go this route, it’s still not a bad idea to store some bottled water as well. Grab-and-go—MAYBE!

Don't Ever Count on Being Home when there's an emergency. In addition to having one at home, create grab-and-go bags for your work and vehicles that contain:

Food (ready to eat) and water

Flashlight and batteries

AM/FM radio

Medications

Seasonal clothing

Blanket

Cell phone charger

Pen and notepad

Personal toiletries

Small First-Aid kit

Extra pair of glasses or contacts

Cash in small bills

Local map with your family meeting place identified

Whistle

December 30, 2015-B.C. feels a bump in the night — a 4.3 magnitude earthquake

There were no reports of damage or injury following the 11:39 p.m. jolt centred north of Victoria and felt across much of southern B.C. Tuesday night's 4.7-magnitude earthquake is just a hint of what could strike at any time. An earthquake struck near Sidney, British Columbia, according to Earthquakes Canada. It happened 19 kilometres northeast of Victoria, 58.7 kilometres below the earth’s surface, at 11:39 p.m. on Tuesday, December . it was the strongest tremor to shake B.C.'s south coast in years. Some thought a car had rammed their home. Others thought it was someone pounding on the door; or at 23:39 some actually claim they thought it was ”the neighbours moving furniture”.~~Al (Alex-Alexander) D Girvan.

If Indeed, Some Of You Still Require Such; More Proof That Something Desperately Needs To Be Done About Air Pollution.

Not so long ago, our ancestors, fathers mothers, uncles aunts knew an ELK

- on sight. They also knew that a Wapiti 

(found only in North America; mostly in Canada) was not an ELK. AND that an Elk did not, even remotely, resemble a mouse.

Mice are a large group of mammals, with more than 130 species found worldwide. In Alberta, there are 7 species of mice and 12 species of voles.

The most troublesome and economically important of the species found in Alberta are the house mouse

(which is not a native species), the white-footed mouse

and the meadow vole commonly called field mouse).

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Economic Losses to Mice.

There is no way of placing a monetary value on human suffering and damage caused by mice. The greatest loss is probably not what mice eat, but what is wasted and contaminated. In six months, one pair of mice can eat more than two kilograms (4 lbs.) of food and deposit about 18,000 droppings. Food contaminated by mice is about ten times greater than the amounts eaten. Food wasted by mouse nibbling is also much more than the amount eaten. So common are mice that it is no wonder their hairs and sometimes droppings, end up in all types of food commodities, from canned beans to loaves of bread.

Structural damage caused by rodents can be expensive. In recent years the trend toward use of insulated confinement facilities to raise swine and poultry, for instance, has led to increased rodent damage. Mice are very destructive to rigid foam, fibreglass batt, and other types of insulation in walls and attics of such structures.

Mice also gnaw wooden structures causing grain and feed to be wasted. They also undermine buildings by burrowing, which eventually causes structural failure and collapse.

Electrical wiring gnawed by mice causes many fires each year, listed as "cause unknown".

Public Health Impact.

Mice and their parasites are implicated in the transmission of a number of diseases including salmonellosis, rickettsia pox and most recently hantavirus. Bacterial food poisoning occurs when foods become contaminated with infected rodent droppings. Mice also carry many types of tapeworms and roundworms, infectious to pets and humans. Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, which causes severe illness and even death in humans, is transmitted by several mouse species including the white-footed mouse.

To reduce the risk of contracting organisms transmitted by mice, you should practise these common sense precautions:

·         Eliminate mice from residential areas by removing food sources and access for mice.

·         Clean up mouse-contaminated areas by using wet methods, including disinfectants such as Chlorine Bleach.

·         Handle mice and other rodents with gloved hands.

·         Avoid sweeping and vacuuming when possible, and wear a dust mask to reduce exposure to fine dust particles.

·        Campers should avoid obviously infested areas. In high risk areas wear a high efficiency, particulate respirator.

·        Discourage children from playing with or trapping mice. Wild mice should not be kept as pets, or for "science projects".

·         De-worm household and farmyard pets regularly. ~~Al (Alex-Alexander) D. Girvan.

A Little Bit, About Ticks and Tick Removal

Deer Tick-Public Domain image

Camping and hiking are high-risk activities for encountering ticks, so remember to pack a straw and thread (or thin dental floss) next time you head into the woods(read why, toward end of this article.

Ticks-Latin Name (Common Name): Diseases they can transmit

Ixodes scapularis (deer tick or black legged tick): Lyme, babesiosis, anaplasmosis, Powassan encephalitis, tick paralysis, tularemia, Bartonella

Amblyomma americanum (lone star tick): Human monocytic ehrlichiosis, STARI, tularemia, tick paralysis, Rocky Mountain spotted fever (RMSF)

Dermacentor variabilis (American dog tick): RMSF, tularemia, human monocytic ehrlichiosis

Dermacentor andersoni (wood tick): RMSF, tularemia, Colorado tick fever, tick paralysis, Q fever

Ixodes pacificus (western black legged tick): Lyme, babesiosis, anaplasmosis, bartonella

Amblyomma maculatum (Gulf Coast tick): Rickettsia parkeri rickettsiosis

Do not EVER, ROTATE OR SQUEEZE the body of the tick.

Obviously, the following tick removal methods are NOT recommended:

1. Gripping the tick with thumb and forefinger and tugging at it. Doing so will cause the tick to regurgitate stomach contents—BAD NEWS.

2. Rotating the body of the tick, IN ANY WAY. Mouth parts have barbs which dig into flesh. Rotating the tick’s body, in any way will simply twist it off, leaving the mouth parts imbedded and YOU open to Lyme disease infection-BAD NEWS.

3. Burning the tick off with a match or cigarette lighter,

4. “Suffocating” the tick with petroleum jelly or hot oil

Avoid methods 3 &4 for the same reasons that you now avoid methods 1&2.

The safest rule as regards to how long it takes a tick to transmit a borreliosis to YOU is, ‘the sooner YOU remove the tick the greater the chance of preventing infection’. This is one reason why checking over your body carefully at the end of a long walk in the woods, then showering using a facecloth and back scrubber to scrub the body is usually sufficient to avoid infection even if the tick has already attached because ticks can be brushed off easily if not yet fully attached.

Even Better Than Tick Removal Is; AVOID Them.

Do Not Allow Ticks To Attach In The First Place.

Wearing long pants and sleeves, and walking with a friend who can keep an eye on your back means that you have time to see the tick and brush it off before it attaches. Keep switching positions of who is in back if walking single file. Look frequently for signs of ticks on you or your friend. If you find an attached tick, remove the tick as completely and as quickly as possible.

Ticks in the larval or nymphalid stage of development acquire the Lyme disease bacterium (Borrelia burgdorferi) by feeding on the blood of an infected host. Although we now know we not only have Borrelia burgdorferi in our ticks to cause borreliosis (Lyme disease) in humans, we also have other strains and species such as Borrelia miyamotoi, Borrelia hermsii, etch.

For example, with the recently discovered Borrelia miyamotoi, the mother tick can pass the infection to the egg which in turn can pass it to the larvae, on to the nymph and adult. Larvae hatch in the thousands so if you encounter these you may be at risk, and unfortunately they are not much bigger than the period at the end of this sentence making them very hard to detect.

One good thing is that, unlike mosquitoes (which can attach and begin feeding within seconds of landing on you) ticks take much more time to crawl to a suitable spot on your body, bite into your skin, secrete a ‘cement’ that secures them in place, and begin feeding/salivation.

Now though, we must revisit research done on Borrelia burgdorferi, to see if species/strains such as Borrelia miyamotoi follow the same rules now that we already know Borrelia miyamotoi broke the rule about mother tick not being able to pass the bacteria to their eggs. 

We have to revisit everything such as, does it take hours before the tick can transmit the disease to you, and if mosquitos can transmit it.  Mosquitos have been shown to carry Borrelia burgdorferi in their gut, but have not YET been shown to successfully transmit it but does that hold true for all Borrelia species/strains.

Safe tick removal methods

Method 1: If you already have a pair of fine pointed tweezers, and a steady hand, you can grasp The Mouthparts Of The Tick, NOT the body of the tick, and Slowly Pull The Tick Straight Out.

Remember that the skin may be swollen around the site of the tick attachment so if you’re not sure what you’re doing, you may prefer to use a specially designed tool. Method 2: Straw and Knot

The ‘straw and knot’ method is an elegant, easy, effective, low technology tick removal method.Place an ordinary drinking straw at a 45-degree angle over the tick. (The straw is simply being used as a guide to direct the knot).Take a length of thread (or dental floss) and tie a loose knot at the top or midsection of the straw.Slide your knot down the straw to where the tick is attached.Position the knot underneath the tick’s belly, so that the knot will encircle the Embedded Mouthparts Only.SLOWLY, tighten the knot to close snugly around the mouthparts of the tick.Remove the straw and pull the thread in a steady upward motion.

This WILLNOT ONLY cause the tick to detach, but Should Also Inhibit Regurgitation Of Bacteria That May Be In The Midgut.

Method 3: Intradermal Blister

If you’re close to a doctor’s office:

A doctor can inject Xylocaine into the skin below where the tick has attached.

A large Xylocaine-filled blister will form.

After tasting the Xylocaine, the tick should release its grip and back out on its own in order to search for a ‘better-tasting’ host.

Tick Treatment

After a tick has been removed, it’s important to wash the bite site using soap and water, followed with an antiseptic. Over-the-counter antiseptic medications are available at any pharmacy.

Don’t wait to develop symptoms. Go to your doctor and request antibiotics as a precaution.~~Al (Alex-Alexander) D Girvan.