Evaluation of Regional Vulnerability to Disasters by People of Ishikawa, Japan: A Cross Sectional Study Using National Health Insurance Data

• Main Authors: Makoto Fujiu, Yuma Morisaki, Junichi Takayama, Kiyoko Yanagihara, Tatsuya Nishino, Masahiko Sagae, Kohei Hirako
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2018-03-01
• Series: International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
• Subjects: KDB (national health insurance data); vulnerable people; earthquake; disaster evaluation; principal component analysis
• Online Access: http://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/15/3/507

The 2013 Partial Amendment of the Disaster Countermeasures Basic Law mandated that a roster of vulnerable persons during disasters be created, and further development of evacuation support is expected. In this study, the number of vulnerable people living in target analytical areas are identified in terms of neighborhood units by using the National Health Insurance Database to create a realistic and efficient evacuation support plan. Later, after considering the “vulnerability” of an area to earthquake disaster damage, a quantitative evaluation of the state of the disaster is performed using a principle component analysis that further divided the analytical target areas into neighborhood units to make a detailed determination of the number of disaster-vulnerable persons, the severity of the disaster, etc. The results of the disaster evaluation performed after considering the vulnerability of an area are that 628 disaster-vulnerable persons live in areas with a relatively higher disaster evaluation value.