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I'm interested in better understanding the ongoing geological processes that shape St. Louis and the Mississippi Valley region. So far, I've been looking into the history of seismicity in the region, focusing on the fascinating but little known history of the New Madrid earthquakes of 1811 and 1812 -- the most devastating earthquakes to have hit the US east of the Rockies. I've also been exploring how St. Louis and surrounding areas are dealing with the possibility of another earthquake occurring in the future. According to one article I read, one of the biggest uncertainties is what would happen to the heavily engineered Mississippi River in the case of another major tremblor. The shaking could break the levees, flooding wide areas along the river and creating cascading effects. The flow of the river might also reverse completely, as occurred during the New Madrid earthquakes.

On these possibilities and the lack of scientific consensus surrounding intraplate seismicity in this zone, see this article in The Atlantic.

On current efforts to create earthquake hazard maps in St. Louis, see this overview on the US Geological Survey site.

For a deeper dive into the history of the New Madrid earthquakes, see this book by historian of science Conevery Bolton Valencius. 

Though this is a very new area of study and expertise, Columbia University is very highly regarded. The public and other institutions respect this program and school alike. It shows much promise and innovation in the medical and healthcare fields. 

Many studies used as references for this article have to do with the biosocial aspects of diseases. Many of the articles trace the spread of disease in different populations and analyze the population's demographics.  Health care utilization and social aspects are all themes that are seen in most of the references in this study. There are also many epidemiological studies. The dates of studies date back as early as the 80s and as recent as the year the article was written in 2006. This shows an extensive and thorough amount of research. The articles are also taken from reputable sources and journals and written by experts as well, showing a great deal of care and effort gone into research aspects of this article. 

According to Wiley Online Library, this article has been cited by 5 other works, all related in terms of humanitarianism or sexual violence. The articles it has been cited in can be seen here: 

1.  Laura Jordan Jaffee, Disrupting global disability frameworks: settler-colonialism and the geopolitics of disability in Palestine/Israel, Disability & Society, 2016, 31, 1, 116CrossRef
2. JULIA KOWALSKI, Ordering dependence: Care, disorder, and kinship ideology in North Indian antiviolence counseling, American Ethnologist, 2016, 43, 1, 63Wiley Online Library
3. Rosanne Marrit Anholt, Understanding sexual violence in armed conflict: cutting ourselves with Occam’s razor, Journal of International Humanitarian Action, 2016, 1, 1CrossRef
4. Zoë H. Wool, Critical military studies, queer theory, and the possibilities of critique: the case of suicide and family caregiving in the US military, Critical Military Studies, 2015, 1, 1, 23CrossRef
5. Miriam Ticktin, Transnational Humanitarianism, Annual Review of Anthropology, 2014, 43, 1, 273

Emergency response was completely lacking in man power and containment efforts. There wasn't much structure to the efforts taken by emergency response in terms of containment and education of the public. There were far too many of those in need and way too few emergency response teams. Hospitals closed due to lack of personnel as well as doctors getting infected themselves. People were dying left and right and being left on the side of the street. Responders weren't able to get to people in time in some cases. Locals began to take out aggressions and frustrations on emergency responders, despite them working at full capacity. The lack of man power, communication and education lead to the emergency response being sub par in this situation. 

Emergency response isn’t directly addressed in this article. Yet, conditions and forms of violence that are discussed in the article that emergency responders have been documented with facing, clearly effect the way they work and respond to calls. Though emergency response isn’t directly addressed, this article is very relevant to emergency responders since its implications can highly effect the work of EMS and other medical care providers.

I researched current protocols and strategies in place in terms of biosafety. I also researched current microbial threats in terms of organisms and the ways in which we have currently developed to help prevent those specific forms of bioterrorism. I also read up on past bioterrorism events and the effects it had on global protocols as well as the development of emergency response.