In Australia and worldwide there has been a ‘disease transition’ to non-communicable diseases (NCDs), creating a range of challenges for governments, health care and service providers. NCDs such as diabetes are reliant on public health infrastructure (PHI) such as medications, equipment, services, housing, water, food, waste and sanitation. Damage to this infrastructure places the population with NCDs at a greater risk of death and mortality due to disasters. The aim of this research was to address this risk by exploring how the impact of cyclone, storm and flood related disasters on NCDs can be reduced through PHI resilience.

Focus groups and interviews were completed with people who have NCDs, disaster responders, health specialists and government officials across Queensland. The impact of flood, storm and cyclone related disasters on NCDs, resilience concepts and implementation strategies were explored. The data was analysed following qualitative principles. This included data collection and organization, description, classification and interpretation.

Six focus groups and 28 interviews were conducted with a total of 92 participants. The research found disasters impact on the management of NCDs. This included 30 descriptions of how disasters can impact on NCDs; 123 descriptions of PHI, which were categorised into 16 themes; and identified 24 resilience concepts. The analysis also found PHI has an integral role in reducing the impact of disasters on NCDs. The findings will be used to inform the development of a conceptual framework for mitigating the impact of disasters on people NCDs through PHI resilience.

Disasters create a challenge for managing NCDs. To minimise the impact there is a need to have resilient PHI. This means disaster preparedness needs to focus on strengthening PHI, which will also help address modern disease priorities.