Emergency Management of Infectious Diseases

Medical wastewater originating from hospitals specializing in infectious diseases pose a major risk to human and environmental health during pandemics. However, there have been few systematic studies on the management of this type of wastewater management. The function of the Huoshenshan Hospital as a designated emergency field hospital for the treatment of COVID-19 has provided lessons for the management measures of medical wastewater, mainly including: (1) Modern information technology, management schemes, and related standard systems provided the legislative foundation for emergency management of medical wastewater. (2) The three-tier prevention and control medical wastewater management system ensured the discharged wastewater met water quality standards, especially for the leak-proof sealed collection system of the first tier, and the biological and chemical treatment technology of the second tier. (3) The establishment of an effective three-tier medical wastewater quality monitoring accountability system. This system was particularly relevant for ensuring continuous data monitoring and dynamic analysis of characteristic indicators. (4) Information disclosure by government and public supervision promoted successful implementation of medical wastewater management and control measures. Public questionnaires (n = 212) further confirmed the effectiveness of information disclosure. The results of this study can act as methodological reference for the emergency management of wastewater in designated infectious disease hospitals under similar situations.

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:Emergency Management of Infectious Diseases

Clinical Infectious Diseases ◽

10.1086/597092 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 48 (6) ◽

pp. 846-847

Author(s):

Elisabeth E. Adderson

Keyword(s):

Infectious Diseases ◽

Emergency Management

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Logic Analysis of How the Emergency Management Legal System Used to Deal with Public Emerging Infectious Diseases under Balancing of Competing Interests—The Case of COVID-19

Healthcare ◽

10.3390/healthcare9070857 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 9 (7) ◽

pp. 857

Author(s):

Chao Zhang ◽

Lei Hong ◽

Ning Ma ◽

Guohui Sun

Keyword(s):

Infectious Diseases ◽

Emergency Management ◽

Legal System ◽

Conflicts Of Interest ◽

Focal Point ◽

Emerging Infectious Diseases ◽

Legal Framework ◽

Public Interests ◽

Legal Norms ◽

Competing Interests

Development of measures for mitigating public emerging infectious diseases is now a focal point for emergency management legal systems. COVID-19 prevention and containment policies can be considered under the core goal of social and individual interests. In this study we analyzed the complexity between individual and public interests as they conflict when implementing disease preventative measures on an epidemic scale. The analysis was used to explore this complex landscape of conflicting social, public, and legal interests to quantify the potential benefits of public acceptance. Here we use the large-scale COVID-19 epidemic backdrop to examine legal norms of the emergency management legal framework. We find that the implementation of emergency management legal system measures involves the resolution of both direct and indirect conflicts of interest among public groups, individual groups, and various subsets of each. When competing interests are not balanced, optimal policies cannot be achieved to serve and safeguard shared social and community stability, whereas effective social outcomes are obtainable through the development of targeted policies as defined within the emergency management legal system. A balanced legal framework in regards to emergency management legal norms can more effectively serve to mitigate and prevent the continued spread of emerging infectious diseases. Further developing innovative procedural mechanisms as a means to ensure emergency response intervention should take into account the weighted interest of the different social parties to determine priorities and aims to protect legitimate public interests.

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