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Abstract:
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The US blood supply can be negatively impacted by natural disasters due to increased demand for blood to treat victims. Based on an inter-regional model of the US blood supply, we explored the resilience of the blood system in the aftermath of regional simulated earthquakes. Earthquake scenarios were based on high-risk sites identified by the US Geological Survey (USGS) National Seismic Hazard Maps. We used regional blood collections and predicted blood demand using the number of casualties estimated by the HAZUS-MH 2.2 model, for earthquakes of magnitude 7 on the Richter scale (M7). A Particle Swarm Optimization algorithm was used to allocate daily blood transfers among US regions. The estimated blood needed, should an M7 earthquake occur in the West, was 3 times higher than that of an equivalent earthquake in the South (1,338 vs. 466 units). However, the higher blood demand in the West was more rapidly mitigated than in the South due to the higher estimated percentage of elective surgeries that could be cancelled in the former (1.2%) compared to the latter (0.26%). Simulation modeling of such events may help decision-making and strategic planning for emergency preparedness.
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