The Mission of the American Red Cross - Essay Example

?American Red Cross The American Red Cross was formed in the year 1881. The American Red Cross is a non profit kind of organization, which helps the people in need of help during times of disasters. Mission of American Red Cross in the area of disaster relief It was more so formed with a clear aim of giving emergency relief to the people, who are faced by nation wide calamities that ranges from famine, flood and many others . It has been more than a century since the American Red Cross has been following this mission. In most of the cases it has been seen that, the American Red Cross responds immediately to meet with any emergencies that befalls the nation. This is the image that has been portrayed by the organization till now and they have projected this mission of emergency reliefs before the worldwide community in their various forms of advertisements, with an idea to get donations from the public. But now people worldwide really doubt whether the Red Cross, is really involved with the same mission. This is due to a series of mishandlings that the American Red Cross has been involved in the recent past, with respect to the relief efforts being carried out following the 9/11 attacks and the Hurricane Katrina in 2005. (www.associatedcontent.com ) Investigation of the response of the American Red Cross to the Hurricane Katrina emergency concentrating mainly the New Orleans area When the Hurricane Katrina crossed over to the US in 2005 and started to ravage the various parts of the US, the New Orleans and the Mississippi areas were the worst devastated. Most of the affected people in these areas felt that, the America Red Cross was very slow in their response to the disaster and the relief work was heavily crippled due to the inadequacy of the shelters across the affected areas of New Orleans and Mississippi. As a result of this they were not in a position to provide adequate food as well as other necessary facilities, which were quite essential for the people during their worst times. Indeed it was the coastal areas that were totally neglected by the Red Cross organization and they argued that there were logistical problems associated with it, since adequate shelters were not set up. It was a really appalling situation since the victims felt that they were neglected by the American Red Cross when compared to the huge funds and donations, which they had received from the American government. It was argued by most of the top officials of the American Red Cross that, the organization felt the need for setting up shelters in areas which did not have risk of getting flooded and was safe for the survivors of the Hurricane Katrina. Most of the people felt that the organization did not make its presence felt in the rural as well as the densely populated areas, which were in dire requirement for relief and rehabilitation. The flood hit areas did not have relief shelters and so adequate supply of food and relief materials could not be routed to these coastal areas. The officials also argued that the Hurricane affected areas was so vast that, the organization was not in a position to deal with such a situation properly and in a timely manner. These factors complicated and hampered the whole issue of the flood relief to the New Orleans and the Mississippi areas. The Officials also pinpointed the lack of fuel that was very much required for transporting the essential supplies to the affected areas. But when compared to these areas that were worst hit, the other areas that were present in the other states across the US, were served much better by the American Red Cross. The way the American Red Cross used the 6 core tasks of Case Management in managing the clients during the Katrina emergency. Case Management is a management system, which helps in the administration of the care for individuals who are in a serious state of disturbance both physically as well as mentally. Indeed it is through the process of the Case Management, that the people in any social organization are able to prolong and improve the quality of the care taking services needed by individuals during times of need. The needs could be during national emergencies and disasters as in the case of the Hurricane Katrina, which caused devastation to millions of Americans mainly in the areas of New Orleans and coastal areas of Mississippi. Thus the American Red Cross was the main organization, that was involved in the relief and rescue operations following the Hurricane and Case Management had to be effectively followed by the organization so that, the essential supplies and health care and counseling services reached the millions of the victims and the survivors of the deadly Hurricane Katrina. As a result in any type of case management the organizations do appoint appropriate and well efficient Case Managers who are entrusted with various tasks, that enhance the services offered by the organization with respect to the case, that is being entrusted with them. Due to this the Case managers have to take care of various activities and also look to it that, the tasks they shoulder have to be accomplished in a timely and efficient manner. Thus the six core tasks of Case Management can be summarized as below: 1. To reach out the needy clients as well as rightly identify and engage the clients into the various services, that is provided by the organization. 2. To rightly assess the various needs of the individuals. 3. Take adequate steps to arrange and provide the essential support services like shelters, food and medical care as in the case of the relief efforts undertaken and that are very much required during national emergencies and disasters. 4. Use a monitoring system from time to time so as to check the efficiency of the relief and medical aid, which is being provided to the victims. 5. The Case Managers appointed by the organization have to look over the process of linking the clients to the various services, which are provided by the organization and also look into the process of providing the rehabilitative and health care services themselves, depending upon the seriousness of the situation on hand. 6. Last but not the least the organization as well as the case managers have to see to it that, they really fight for as being the advocates for ensuring that, the clients get their rights as well as the entitlements and financial aid from the government. A proper check is done about the American Red Cross in its relief and rehabilitation efforts during and in the aftermath of the Hurricane Katrina, to see whether as an organization they have followed successfully the six core principles of the Case Management. It can be seen that they have been successful in accomplishing certain tasks of case Management, while in many others they have lagged behind due to certain shortcomings. In the case of the American Red cross the first core task of case Management as to the process of reaching out to the needy people during the Hurricane Katrina is to indentify the victims and survivors and rightly guide them to the various relief camps. During the course of the Hurricane Katrina the Red Cross was able to provide temporary form of housing to about 2 million people in the various motels, which were spread across 45 states. In the aftermath of the hurricane they were able to provide shelter to about 2.3 million of the survivors, by housing them in about 900 shelters spread across 26 states in the country. Thus this shows that the organization was very successful in satisfying this core task of finding out survivors and providing adequate services to them. In the case of assessing the needs of the survivors and the victims also they were really successful, since the volunteers and the Salvation Army could easily identify the needs of the survivors and were able to differentiate the people who needed emergency medical aid, treatments and those of whom who needed counseling. The third core task of providing the essential life support services like the shelters, food and medical aid also, the organization and its volunteers with the Salvation Army have been very successful, since they were able to provide hot meals to about 12 million and snacks to about 8 million affected people. Apart from this the organization was able to provide health care services to roughly 2.8 million people. This shows that the organization had been able to provide the adequate relief supplies to such an overwhelming population. The core task of immediate relief supplies and also the time to time monitoring system to oversee the relief and rescue operations also have been successfully met with by the American Red Cross. As soon as the Hurricane Katrina crossed over to the US, thousands of the Red Cross Relief workers from about 50 states responded almost immediately to see that, the relief and rescue operations underwent without any hitches. Even after days of the disaster the Red Cross relief teams along with the managers of the organization, monitored the whole situation even after a span of about 30 days, so as to provide temporary housing facilities to the victims, till alternative shelters were made available to them. Another core task of linking the clients with the various services offered by the organization has also been dealt with quite successfully. The organization created a Family linking registry in which around two million survivors and victims got registered. This made it possible for getting information and ultimately get united with the family members. The final core tack of ensuring that the organization acted in advocating the victims to getting the entitlements as well as the adequate financial aids, has also been met with by the organization. Ever since the Hurricane disaster, the organization has assisted the victims in getting the financial aid to approximately about three and half million survivors. This was enabled by means of creating funds by means of the cards, vouchers, checks and many other forms of money collection procedures, aimed for providing the financial aid to the victims. The Ways in which the American Red Cross failed to follow the guidelines of Case Management A whopping amount of $1.8 billion was given to the American Red Cross, for proceeding with the relief operations following the Hurricane Katrina. This was done with an aim that the Red Cross will be involved in the relief operations for the Hurricane victims, by means of delivering the emergency food relief, setting up of the shelters and also providing the adequate medical care to the needy. But the money received by the organization has not been utilized properly for the Hurricane Katrina relief operations. (www.associatedcontent.com ) As per the volunteers and the relief workers who were involved in the relief operations in the aftermath of the Hurricane Katrina have reported that, the way the organization responded to the whole crisis was really shocking. Most of them which included the public officials as well as the affected people felt that, the relief operation undertaken by the organization was really slow. They also felt that the relief operations were done in a much disorganized fashion and most of the remote Gulf coastal communities were totally neglected. Though the organization was very successful in following the core tasks of the Case Management they faltered in the areas of the New Orleans and the gulf coasts areas of the Mississippi. In most of the rural and the densely populated areas of these two states, the American Red Cross failed miserably in providing the adequate relief and rescue measures. The organization has argued that, it is due to the flooding of the coastal areas and also the lack of adequate number of shelters in these areas, which hampered the relief activities. In addition to this the organization officials also felt the lack of fuel as the main reason because of which they could not transport the relief supplies to the coastal and densely populated rural areas. Thus this has become a real black mark for the entire organization with respect to their handling of the relief efforts in the New Orleans and Mississippi areas, which required the utmost attention. The ways in which the American Red Cross used a “ systems thinking” perspective both in its preparations for the disaster and in its response to the disaster The systems thinking is indeed an approach through which any individual or an organization, can get a very good view of a particular situation and then develop strategies and approaches, that can be applied to that particular situation in order to produce the desired kind of result. In the case of the American Red Cross organization, their system thinking with respect to the Hurricane Katrina disaster and the relief efforts have in many ways yielded only very marginal results. The ways in which “systems thinking” was neglected The whole organization did not foresee the consequences that could occur due to major catastrophes and as a result they were totally unprepared to go forwards with the relief operations on a large scale. Though they could muster their relief operations to a very negligible population, they could not do any type of justification to the people who badly required the relief and aid operations, in spite of getting huge funds from the American government to go forward with the relief work. This shows that the Red Cross management did not have proper planning and lacked visionaries, to foresee and plan the organization’s relief and rescue operations during a very big national emergency or disaster. As a result of this the organization as a whole was crippled and helpless when the need arose for it to deal appropriately because it lacked the much needed resources, that it should have planned and stocked up for utilizing them during an emergency. Hence the management of the American Red Cross did not how to deal with the situations like the Hurricane Katrina. They concentrated only on the efforts of carrying out the relief operations only in less densely populated areas and totally neglected the areas like New Orleans and the coastal areas of Mississippi, which were rural and densely populated. This was the major drawback and the main failure for which the organization got severe criticism from the American government as well as from the general public. Thus in all these above circumstances the systems thinking, was totally neglected by the American Red Cross organization. The ways by which the target agency linked effectively to external systems The American Red Cross was able to successfully link with the agencies like the NOAA which is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to the Radio emergency service, which is a component of its own organization. This kind of link enabled the organization to get the latest information and the weather reports regarding the movement of the Hurricane Katrina, which was passed on to the millions of the radio listeners through its broadcasting system. Timely food supplies and clean water were enabled to victims because these two main components present within the Red Cross were able to negotiate with the external government agencies and health care institutions and hospitals to get the adequate food, water supplies as well as the required and timely medical care and aid to the Hurricane Katrina victims. They also were responsible for many of the welfare and the health activities that helped thousands of people. Due to their time bound and relentless efforts, the Salvation Army was able to locate and find out more than twenty five thousand displaced victims of the Hurricane Katrina. Thus by means of their efforts they were able to strengthen the infrastructure of the social service of several states, that were affected by the Hurricane and also due to the floods that followed. The ways in which their linkage was ineffective Their linkage was very ineffective to the people located in the remote areas of New Orleans and the Mississippi Changes and suggestions to improve American Red Cross disaster response The following can be considered as the Suggestions to improve the American Red Cross disaster response. 1. Develop plans and have a clear cut strategy so as to carry on relief operations in the remote areas. This can be done by strengthening the logistical planning division within the organization. 2. The creation of a good financial department, which could check the flow in of funds and donations into the organization and to develop the strategies and plans so as to utilize the funds for the intended purpose. 3. To create a department within the organization, that can effectively control and manage the activities of the relief workers and volunteers. This can be done with an aim to channelize and motivate the efforts of the volunteers and give them the right set of directions, for speeding up the relief process. This will strengthen the management of the American Red Cross for the future disaster and relief operations. References: Mitchell Mike, “American Red Cross: Stealing Your Donation Money” www.associatedcontent.com March09, 2009. Web. March27, 2011. Read More

 

Read More