Methods for Measuring the Population after a Disaster

In the immediate aftermath of a disaster, estimating population size becomes a uniquely challenging and critically important decision-support function that informs disaster response and recovery.With previous demographic data in question or obsolete, estimates of the size and distribution of the affected population guide all sectors of planning, from the placement of emergency medical and public safety assets to the allocation of temporary housing and reconstruction dollars. In confronting the effects of a significant natural or man-made disaster, planners require flexible demographic tools with which to address the need for fast, accurate, and low resource data collection.

In the weeks and months after Hurricane Katrina, planners from the City of New Orleans (CNO) Emergency Operations Center (EOC) and researchers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) developed and implemented a series of rapid household surveys to estimate the size and distribution of New Orleans’ returning population. Several months after the last CNO-EOC household survey, the state requested federal assistance to conduct household surveys across 18 parishes, including Orleans Parish, in the 2006 Louisiana Health and Population Survey (LHPS). The methods used in conducting these surveys provided a rapid, reliable, and low resource means for planners to produce demographic estimates in the aftermath of Katrina.