A NADA member recently wrote to us with a question about using the NADA protocol during disasters. He said he “was curious about NADA’s presence during disasters, and how that process is achieved.â€
Sara Bursac, NADA’s executive director, responded:
Thanks so much for the question. The process is achieved through many different avenues.
- There is Acupuncturists Without Borders, a whole organization devoted to providing the NADA protocol during disasters, often in international settings, but also in the United States. They are separate from us and we don’t have any formal partnership, but we will often be in touch with each other when an event has occurred.
- Members will reach out to us when a disaster happens in their community and let us know if they are initiating some kind of a response. Then we may reach out to other members to help bring people together so they can support each other in the effort.
- In California, Colorado and New Mexico there are units affiliated with the Medical Reserve Corps (MRC) that respond during disasters, and the NADA protocol is often included. In Colorado, for example, that will be through the Colorado Acupuncture Medical Reserve Corps, and, in New Mexico, it is through an integrated health MRC team. There is a MRC unit in Santa Barbara, CA, that uses acupuncture. When she was NADA president, Libby Stuyt encouraged all NADA members to join their local MRC as a way to bring NADA in on a community level.
Since responding to disasters is part of our history, but not an active mandate of what we do, we typically try to connect people and share information when it comes to a particular event. We don’t deploy any staff to a disaster site as we are simply too small for that.