Harmonising health and safety regions in the Netherlands

Abstract

A good organisation of Disaster and Emergency medicine is important but also very complex, because of the participation of many parties with different procedures, structures and cultures. The H1N1 pandemic is one of the most important issues at this moment for the Disaster and Emergency medicine. Collaboration, on a large scale, not only with public health organisations, hospitals and general practioners, but also with police, fire services, local, regional and national authorities must be performed without unnecessary obstacles. Recent amendments of the Public Health Act aim at harmonising the leadership, organisation and spatial boundaries of health and safety regions in the Netherlands. Also a publication of the Public Order and Safety Inspectorate shows that there is still much room for improvement. In this edition, after a introduction by Vonk Noordegraaf and Smilde, De Vries, Smeekes and Klaassen and Richardus describe the importance of these developments, but also the problems still left. IJzermans urges the necessity to do scientific research for a more evidence based Disaster and Emergency medicine.