Department of Security Studies, Polish Air Force Academy, Dęblin, Poland.
Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Disaster Med Public Health Prep. 2019 Aug;13(4):709-712. doi: 10.1017/dmp.2018.171. Epub 2019 Mar 14.
The increased risk of mass accidents or major catastrophes taking place necessitates the organization of remedial measures to help protect against these unusual events and adequate preparation in order to minimize their effects. One such initiative is the early notification of residents within a specific area about the risk of a particular calamity. Nowadays, the prevalence of mobile devices enables the installation of various mobile applications allowing for the communication and receiving of information about potential dangers. In many countries there are variously developed systems of notification in place based specifically on text messages.
Currently, new laws introduced in Poland establish that it is the obligation of operators of mobile networks to send text messages to all customers of these networks who are within the area where there is a serious risk of a catastrophe. Such messages are in the form of a short alert, to be sent only in extraordinary situations when there is an immediate threat to health or life. The alert is intended to help in the avoidance of danger or to mitigate its impact.
This article presents the potential implementation of the early warning system based on text message alerts in Poland, and in particular focuses on decreasing the risks associated with natural disasters.
While early text messaging is essential to disaster communications and mitigation, the article further states that means must be found to ensure equal access to the most vulnerable populations and all those, vulnerable and not, who do not have immediate access to text messaging systems. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2019;13:709-712).
大规模事故或重大灾难风险的增加需要组织补救措施，以帮助防范这些异常事件，并做好充分准备，将其影响降至最低。其中一项举措是提前向特定区域的居民通报特定灾难的风险。如今，移动设备的普及使得可以安装各种移动应用程序，从而能够进行关于潜在危险的通信和信息接收。在许多国家，都有各种基于短信的通知系统。
目前，波兰新颁布的法律规定，移动网络运营商有义务向网络覆盖范围内的所有客户发送有关严重灾难风险地区的短信。此类短信是简短警报的形式，仅在对健康或生命有直接威胁的特殊情况下发送。警报旨在帮助避免危险或减轻其影响。
本文提出了在波兰实施基于短信警报的预警系统的潜力，特别是侧重于降低与自然灾害相关的风险。
虽然提前发送短信对于灾难通信和缓解至关重要，但文章还指出，必须找到确保最弱势群体以及所有没有即时访问短信系统的脆弱和非脆弱人群都能平等获取信息的方法。（灾害医学与公共卫生准备。2019；13:709-712）。
