Get Healthy Carson City: Lead up to National PrepareAthon! Day

This column appears in the Nevada Appeal Wednesday health pages. It addresses topics related to the health of our community.

Throughout this month, Carson City Health & Human Services and community partners have encouraged you to take specific actions to prepare yourself, your family and your community for emergency disasters that affect our area the most. Sept. 25-30 is week five of National Preparedness Month. The theme for this week is “Lead Up to National PrepareAthon Day,” which occurs on Friday, Sept. 30, 2016.

National PrepareAthon! Day is an awareness campaign that aims to increase the number of individuals who understand which disasters can happen in their community, know what to do to be safe and mitigate damage, and help their community do the same.

The following are examples of how you can participate in the nationwide effort:

Sign up for an emergency alert system such as CodeRed, housed at Carson City Fire Department, to receive important information and updates during a disaster.

Test your family, personal and business preparedness and communications plans.

Maintain a detailed inventory of your property’s contents. This will help you prove value of what you own, which could speed up your claim process in the event of property damage or loss.

Help a friend develop their personal preparedness plan and connect them to www.Ready.gov for additional tools and resources.

Start a conversation about preparedness planning with members of your church, book club, or child’s school.

Once you complete your activities, be sure to register your actions on the America’s PrepareAthon! Day website: www.community.fema.gov.

For more information about other Health Department services, check out our website at www.gethealthycarsoncity.org or visit us at www.facebook.com/cchhs.

This article is part of a 4-part series developed for National Preparedness Month. The Public Health Preparedness (PHP) Division at Carson City Health & Human Services recognizes National Preparedness Month, which serves as a reminder we all must take action to prepare, now and throughout the year, for the types of emergencies that could affect us where we live, work and visit. The PHP program is funded entirely by federal grants from the Centers from Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR), awarded each year through the Nevada Division of Public and Behavioral Health. CCHHS works closely with many partner agencies in the community, such as Emergency Management, Carson Tahoe Healthcare and the Salvation Army to accomplish preparedness activities across Western Nevada.