California Fires

(Incendios Forestales)

HHS is part of a coordinated federal response to the California wildfires. The fires and their smoke pose a number of health risks including serious respiratory ailments reaching far beyond the wildfire boundaries. Smoke can hurt your eyes, irritate your respiratory system, and worsen chronic heart and lung diseases.The fires have also affected local health infrastructures.

HHS advises that people in the affected areas take precautions, and recommends taking the following protective actions:

• Limit exposure to smoke
• Listen to local air quality reports.
• Follow your doctor's advice if you have asthma or another lung disease.
• Do not rely on dust masks commonly found at hardware stores for protection. These masks will not protect your lungs from smoke.

Citizens in the affected area are urged to listen for messages from state and local emergency officials and be aware of evacuation and sheltering orders in their communities.

For the latest information on the federal response

• The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is coordinating the federal response.
• USA.gov, the U.S. government’s official Web portal, has created a central hub for news and information about the California wildfires.
• HHS Support - An HHS Incident Response Coordination Team was dispatched to the Joint Field Office in Pasadena to coordinate federal medical response support. Tuesday night, October 23, HHS activated the National Disaster Medical System (NDMS) and, at the request of California state health officials, two Disaster Medical Assistance Teams (DMATs) were dispatched to San Diego from Washington state and New Mexico. The teams will assist at major evacuation shelters.

NDMS is a federally coordinated system that augments the nation's medical response capability. NDMS provides a single integrated national medical response capability for assisting state and local authorities in dealing with the medical impacts of major disasters.

Each DMAT is a team of 35 professional and para-professional medical personnel (supported by logistical and administrative staff) designed to provide basic medical care during a disaster or other event.

The HHS Operations Center, which is staffed 24 hours a day, is in constant communications with local and state emergency management officials, other federal departments, including Homeland Security and the White House.