News from PAHO/WHO

New Study from the WHO/PAHO Collaborating Center at the University of Antioquia

WHO's network of Collaborating Centers strengthens the technical cooperation that WHO and PAHO provide worldwide. These well-recognized scientific and academic institutions coordinate and carry out training, research and information dissemination within the framework of WHO and PAHO's planned activities.

The Faculty of Public Health of the University of Antioquia is one of these important Centers. Formally designated a WHO Collaborating Center in 1988, it has served as the central coordinating point for disaster preparedness in universities in the region. In 1990, the Collaborating Center published the results of a survey of post-graduate faculties of public health in Latin America. The survey revealed which institutions had incorporated, formally or otherwise, disaster preparedness into their curriculum, and the length and content of these courses. Now the Collaborating Center has completed a new study, targeting undergraduate faculties of medicine and nursing in Colombia. The interesting results have been published and are available (in Spanish only) from the Centro de Documentación de Desastres (see pg. 8 for the address) or from Dr. John Florez, Director, Centro Colaborador en Preparativos pare Emergencias, Universidad de Antioquia, Facultad Nacional de Salud Pública, Apartado Aéreo 1226, Medellín, Colombia.

Disaster Documentation Center

The Disaster Documentation Center in San Jose. Costa Rica invites all readers to become users. Two important publications make it easy for users to request a wide variety of information related to disaster preparedness. prevention and mitigation. Volume 2 of DESINDEX has just been issued, bringing the total number of indexed publications to 1,600, DESINDEX is a comprehensive disaster bibliography. Each entry contains data on author, title, key subject words, publication dates and, in many cases, a summary of the document. DESINDEX is especially intended for libraries, documentation centers, universities or hospitals-where this reference document will be used by a large audience and have a multiplier effect.

BIBLIODES is a selected bibliography, sorting all the material in the Disaster Documentation Center by subject areas. Presently there are three bibliographies available: Earthquakes, Environmental Health and Health Effects of Disasters. BIBLIODES is designed to reach a wider audience and all readers are encouraged to request copies. The Disaster Documentation Center is working on BIBLIODES for other disaster topics-let them know what areas are of interest to you.