Mrs. Wilasinee Samanchate outlined Khon Kaen health sevices and developed a plan for an MCH in disaster committee to cope with unforeseen disaster situations.

1. The City

Lying some 250km northeast of Bangkok, Khon Kaen is at the center of the Northeast Region. It sits on a 300 meter plateau drained by rivers that flow into the Mekong River that forms much of the border between Eastern Thailand and Laos and Cambodia. The region has long been a rich rice area, with roots that go back 4,000 years. It has also been a relatively poor region of Thailand; rice production is primarily rain fed, with little of the extensive irrigation that makes the Central Plain Thailand’s primary agricultural region.

Government policies of regional investment have helped the Northeast, as well as other regions, grow substantially over the past half century. Though still a relatively small town of about 150,000 people, Khon Kaen is a major center for education, commerce, transportation and commerce in the Northeast.

Along with the rest of Thailand, Khon Kaen has seen the steady progression of social services. Primary education is now universal and secondary education now has about three-fourths of the relevant age group. Primary and reproductive health care have been advanced steadily with the development of urban hospitals and provincial and rural health centers. Maternal and Child Health Care services have brought immunizations to virtually all children throughout the city and even to the entire province. The national family planning program has been exceptionally successful, reducing fertility very rapidly and producing an equally rapid reduction of infant and maternal mortality rates. The city is now served by a large number of government and private hospitals, a university teaching hospital, and clinics, with 248 primary health clinics located in and around the city and the rural areas.

Other than heavy rains in the summer rainy season, with occasional flooding, the city and region have been quite free of natural disasters. There is not experience with earthquakes, volcanic eruptions or typhoons.

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Khon Kaen University Hospital

Although primary and maternal and child health services are now exceptionally well developed and widely available, they lack any special capacity to deal with emergencies such as natural disasters. This is largely because the city and region are not subject to large scale flooding, earthquakes, typhoons or other national disasters. Yet emergencies and disasters do happen, and the city is essentially unprepared for them.

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2. The Proposed Action Plan

Mrs. Wilasinee Samanchate, of Khon Kaen’s Bureau of Health and Environment, developed a plan of action to increase the city’s capacity to deal with emergencies. She plans to obtain the mayor’s approval and support to create an MCH Care in Disaster Committee in the city government. This will be headed by the Mayor and will involve all relevant city officials. The committee will consider the issue of natural disasters and work out plans to be prepared for them. It will publish a series of pamphlets as guidelines for city officials, indicating actions to be taken in preparation for a disaster. The Committee will also work to make the local community more aware of the possibilities of emergencies, and show how local communities and individuals can prepare for them. It will train local community leaders to assist in community organization for emergencies.

Khon Kaen Action Plan Time Frame: September 2007 – August 2008