O rainy season 2023/2024 added to tragedies in Minas Gerais. The State Civil Defense released, this Wednesday (April 3), the final balance of those affected by the rains, which left six dead and forced 3,232 miners to leave their homes. The average is that, per month, one victim died and 538 people lost their homes due to floods, floods and storms in the State. Seventeen homes were affected daily. After the assessment, Civil Defense launched a program in schools to teach ways to prevent and protect against disasters.
The survey adds occurrences from September 27, 2023 to March 31 of this year. In total, 2,833 miners were displaced, that is, welcomed into the home of family or friends, and 399 were made homeless when they were taken to public shelters.
Despite the losses, the state agency celebrated the drop of more than 70% in the number of deaths and affected homes. In the rainy season of 2022/2023, 22 died in the State and 15,164 were left homeless or homeless.
According to the Disaster Management Superintendent of the Civil Defense of Minas Gerais, Major Luís Antônio e Silva, the training given to municipalities since April last year was one of the factors that helped reduce the number of victims and those affected. The military reinforces that 561 municipalities received training, that is, 65% of the State. “It was the period in which we had the greatest engagement of cities in these actions”, he highlights.
In the initiative, local agents received training on how to prevent and act in cases of tragedies. “In partnership with the State University of Minas Gerais (UEMG), last year, we carried out, in an unprecedented way, the training course for municipal Civil Defense coordinators. The entity that carries out Civil Defense is the municipality. It is the one that is closest When we train this local agent, we provide knowledge, and he tends to replicate this in preventive actions”, he argues.
According to Major, another contributing factor was the awareness and engagement of the city’s population in protective measures. “We launched educational campaigns to engage the community. Before, we were in eighth place. Now, we are the third state with the highest population engagement”, he celebrates.
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Civil Defense expects these actions to continue, including more courses being taught to prepare municipal agents. “All municipalities are invited to participate in the actions”, says Major Luís Antônio e Silva.
State Civil Defense arrives at schools
A new prevention and awareness action is underway, as announced by the government of Minas. The Civil Defense in Schools program aims to prepare children to take preventive actions to reduce the number of victims of disasters. The project will initially be carried out in the cities of Nova Lima and Rio Piracicaba. At least 400 students will benefit.
“We are starting now, with children from 6th to 9th grade, in Nova Lima (250 students) and Rio Piracicaba (150). We are going to prepare the child so that they have knowledge of Civil Defense actions. We know that children and adolescents can influence homes”, explains the state body’s major.
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