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The Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED) was
established in 1973 as a non-profit institution, with international
status under the Belgian Law. It is located within the School of
Public Health of the Universit? Catholique de Louvain (UCL) in
Brussels. CRED became a World health Organisation Collaborating Centre
in 1980 and has expanded its support of the WHO Global Programme for
Emergency Preparedness and Response.
Although the main focus of the Centre is on safeguards, public health
and the sanitary aspects of disasters, CRED also studies the
socio-economic and long-term effects of these large-scale
disasters. Increasingly, preparedness, principally at the level of
human resource development as well as problems linked to the
management of crises have gained a higher profile within CRED's
activities. The Centre is unique in a field where most agencies
concentrate their efforts on direct action and envisage only rarely
operational and policy research, the evaluation of aid or structural
preparedness. Long-term management, through improved local and
international preparedness, is recognised increasingly as an
indispensable element of emergency aid programmes. This is also the
case in the consideration of disasters during major development
projects, as well as the environmental and socio-economic results of
natural disasters. The goals of CRED are to address these gaps in
both internationa l and national contexts.
Website: "http://www.cred.be/"
[Summary provided by CRED.]
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