Urban Health and Society: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Research and Practice - Part 26. This book provides the most current frameworks, research, and approaches for understanding how unique features of the urban physical and social environments that shape the health of over half of the world's population that is already residing in large cities. Its interdisciplinary research and practice focus is a welcome innovation. | Discussion Questions 231 range of beneficial features there are also large numbers of poor individuals in these This is increasingly true in those areas that are witnessing the most rapid urban growth Asia and The perspective that we have put forward here and others have advanced elsewhere12 suggests that poorer individuals moving to or growing up in these settings will not only have reduced access to material resources but their political voices will be silenced and their living conditions will likely expose them to pollutants and increase vulnerability to hazards. Dense housing and narrow roads coupled with a range of heating and cooking materials and a lack of publicly funded firefighters put urban dwellers at increased risk of hazards and disasters. The peripheral positioning of many slums also makes them likely to experience floods. These same conditions along with material deprivation and food insecurity also erode health and well-being in the predisaster setting. Unfortunately cities do not appear to be proactively preparing for a disaster Of 109 cities in Africa and Asia 34 percent lacked building codes 46 percent lacked hazard mapping and 54 percent did not have hazard insurance available for public or private We suggest that these preexisting vulnerabilities set the stage for a tremendous burden in the event of disasters in urban areas worldwide. SUMMARY In this chapter we have sought to extend public health perspectives on disasters from the typical approach which uses a medical model of disaster preparedness to the broader issue of why some populations appear to suffer greater health consequences of disasters than others. Our objectives were largely theoretical and conceptual. We suggested that greater attention to the socioecological determinants of the postdisaster context may help to reveal insights for prevention and intervention to reduce the disparate impact of disasters. We also suggested that data collection .
