Question

How can ethics/morals in disasters (i.e natural disasters) be encouraged?

discuss for both emergency responders and as a victims.

Answer 1

In times of natural disasters, the rules and common courtesy often are overlooked by the people in an around the disaster. This is because the question of survival comes into play and as a result, we often overlook our values, principles and social norms in order to ensure survival of self and immediate relatives.

However, if we have to encourage ethics and morals during natural disaster then we need to plan this out with a long term strategy and there cannot be a short term fix for such situations. First of all, we need to understand that natural disasters are not planned. Naturally, planning for any precautionary measure way ahead is impractical. However, we can train ourselves and our society on ethical and moral responsibilities.

The key principles of moral/ethical values are the four pillars that hold our ethical stand point. They are non-maleficence, beneficence, justice and autonomy. During a natural disaster we need to keep these pillars standing. For example, if we are working as emergency responders we need to make sure that we are working towards a greater good (beneficence) and not for selfish reasons. Similarly, following these pillars may be extremely difficult for a victim in a natural disaster. However, these habits and values needs to be inculcated in the society over a long term rather than short term.

For the short terms responses, the organizations that are focusing on the rescue operations need to lay down strict code of conduct and ethical training. This is because during natural disasters there may be easy opportunities to exploit the victims and these measures need to be in place to prevent them.