TAKE STOCK – WEEK 26

Good personal hygiene is important under normal circumstances.  In an emergency or after a disaster has occurred it is still important but not necessarily as easy to accomplish.

This week TAKE STOCK of how well you will be able to maintain personal hygiene if the water isn’t flowing from the faucet or it’s been contaminated and is unsafe to use.

The water we store in our 72-hour kits for emergency use (3 gallons per person) is only enough for very basic uses.  In fact, it’s not much more than the minimum amount adults should drink each day (2.3 liters for women, 3.3 liters for men per the Institute of Medicine).  This is not enough to also re-hydrate dehydrated or freeze-dried food, or flush the toilet, or to bathe, or wash your clothes.

Those of us using well water have a built-in wake-up call to help our households understand their water use.  Every time the electricity goes out, the well pump goes out too. Next time this happens, take notes of every attempt to function normally – reaching for the faucet to brush your teeth or get a drink of water, or to flush the toilet, and think “Drat, can’t do that.”  

I don’t know how those on city water can replicate this experience – can you turn off your water for a day?  At any rate, find a way to run a similar test. 

Understanding how your family uses water will help you identify changes you need to make to your family’s water preparedness to be able to manage during an emergency.

After you TAKE STOCK of how dependent you are on running water, determine how you will offset those needs in an emergency.

This article on the CDC site may also help you maintain personal hygiene in an emergency.

Personal Hygiene During an Emergency | Water, Sanitation, & Hygiene-related Emergencies & and Outbreaks | Healthy Water | CDC

Make Water Safe During an Emergency (Print-only) (cdc.gov)