In a disaster situation, it is important to remember those who already have their own unique challenges in their daily lives. Too often, the disabled are overlooked in favor of quickly helping a community overwhelmed by the loss of basic services due to flooding or other severe storm damage that could have needs like power and sanitation paralyzed for days, weeks, or otherwise. in extreme cases, months and months. even years.
Floods in particular present a particular danger that goes beyond property damage, affecting basic health by contaminating freshwater sources and forcing displaced survivors to seek refuge in emergency shelters. In the United States, most places used as emergency shelters are typically not equipped to hold so many people at one time, such as churches, school gyms, or other sports venues. This puts much more pressure on already dubious sanitation services in a disaster-stricken area and makes the disabled much more difficult to accommodate if they have special needs to consider. Life-threatening infections that contaminated water can spread include, but are not limited to, E. coli, giardia, salmonella, and hepatitis A.
The easiest solution to this problem is staggeringly simple: portable toilets, in other words, the humble porta-potty.
Portable rental toilets, or urinals as many call them, are self-contained chemical toilets. Just as importantly though, the portable potty can be found in ADA compliant models. They don’t need existing plumbing to connect where they’re needed most, so if local waste treatment facilities are damaged, they won’t add any stress to an already compromised system. Sewage disposal can be trucked from where the temporary shelters are located to a nearby community that is not as affected. This, combined with the bottled water distribution and portable handwashing stations that many porta-potty companies now have available, radically reduces the potential for disease spread.
By including ADA-compliant restrooms in these temporary disaster situations, that added protection is extended not only to the disabled, but also to the elderly who may have more difficulty sitting and standing in confined spaces (like a standard porta-potty). , or disaster victims who have been injured and cannot move as easily as usual. Ensuring that ADA-compliant portable toilets are included in disaster areas along with handicap-accessible portable handwashing stations protects not only the disabled, but also the elderly and the rest of a stressed population from the spread. of serious diseases.
