Home Preparedness – How to Ensure Emergency Preparedness at Home
For how long should you be able to manage on your own in a crisis? According to the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency (MSB), you should ensure sufficient emergency preparedness at home so that you can manage on your own for at least seven days. The first thing you should do is put together an emergency kit and stock your pantry with extra food.
In this article, we’ll share our tips for what you can do and what things you can buy to ensure emergency preparedness.
Checklist for your home preparedness
Here’s our own prepping list of home preparedness essentials:
- Crank radio or battery radio
- Torch, head torch, lantern
- Cans or plastic bottles with clean water
- Sustainable food that can be stored at room temperature
- Camping stove with fuel
- Sleeping bags, warm clothes, and blankets
- Matches, tealights, and candles
- Alternative heat source powered by wood, kerosene, gas, or diesel
- Medicines and first aid kits
- Hygiene products
- Power bank, charged batteries, and spare batteries
- Cash
- Note pad with important phone numbers and other information
What do I need for my home preparedness?
Home preparedness can be divided into several areas to make it a little more manageable:
Water
Access to clean water is a necessity for life. MSB recommends having at least three litres of water available per adult per day.
Buy water containers and fill with water – then store in a dark and cool place. Replace with fresh water at regular intervals.
If you are unsure about the water quality, you should boil it.
Food
Stock up on extra food at home. Choose food with a long shelf life that can be stored at room temperature. It is preferable that much of the stored food can be eaten without cooking and with little or no water.
Good food for home preparedness includes canned food and dry goods. Eggs are underrated prepping foods. They have a long shelf life, even at room temperature.
Only buy food that you are willing to eat. Then you can eat from your emergency pantry and stock up with new products as the food is consumed so that the best before date is never reached.
Heating
If there is a power outage in the winter, your home will quickly get cold if you don’t have a wood burner, stove or fireplace. You can prepare by designating a room in which your family can gather. It’s a good idea to set up the room with carpets on the floor and by sealing doors and windows. If it gets really cold, you can build a shelter under a table to trap heat. Take out your winter clothes and buy sleeping bags.
It is possible to get extra heat from tealights, ethanol fireplaces or kerosene stoves. But consider the fire risk and ensure good ventilation.
Communication
It is important to be able to obtain accurate information in the event of a crisis, war, or a serious accident. News and the Swedish emergency population warning (VMA) are broadcast on Swedish Radio P4. Get yourself a battery-powered radio or crank radio.
Make sure to keep your mobile phone charged and get a power bank (extra battery) so that you have a source of power in an outage. Buy a few packs of spare batteries.
Write down important phone numbers, such as those of family members, friends, and the municipality. Use the number 113 13 to both obtain and provide important information about an ongoing crisis.
Payments and cash
It’s not hard to imagine the chaos there would be if bank cards, Swish, and internet banks stop working. This can happen if there’s a power outage, IT attack, or other problems. So it’s good to keep cash in small denominations at home. It also doesn’t hurt to have accounts in different banks and to have different bank cards available.
Medicines
If you take prescription or chronic medication, you should get into the habit of keeping stock that can last for a whole month. But remember, just like with food, to use your medicine stock and replenish as it is consumed so that the medicine doesn’t get stale.
Other
You should keep extra candles. It gets dark when the electricity goes out. A battery-powered torch is great, but a head torch is perhaps even more practical to use. A crank radio is usually equipped with lights as well. It’s also a good idea to a kerosene lamp or battery-powered LED lantern.
Remember to stock enough of all the necessary hygiene products. Toilet paper, sanitary towels, nappies, soap, and wet wipes.
If you have pets, you need to have enough food and water for them as well.
To keep yourself entertained, it can be a good idea to have games, such as a deck of cards and different board games.
Why should you be able to manage on your own for at least a week?
We live in a society where most things work as they should. But if something extreme happens, such as a crisis or war, you must be prepared in case resources in society are not sufficient. The authorities will need to prioritise to ensure that those with the greatest need get help first.
In 2020, the Swedish government made a decision to recommend that private individuals have at least one week of supplies at home. It is your and my responsibility to follow that recommendation.
By reviewing your home preparedness, you can take strain off society so that those who are really vulnerable can get the help they need. Plus, you’ll feel much more reassured knowing that you can manage on your own for a while!
What could happen?
There are many examples of scenarios to prepare for. The most likely scenario is a prolonged power outage. This can happen in the event of an IT attack, flood, forest fire, snowstorm, electricity shortage or war.
If there is no electricity, the heat in your home is also likely to dissipate. It becomes difficult to cook and the municipal water stops working.
The food in shops runs out, if it is even possible to shop. You can’t pay by card and your phone stops working. You can’t access the internet. Public transport may stop and you will not be able to fill or charge your car. In addition, it becomes difficult to obtain medicines.
It is also possible that you will be isolated in your home for a period of time, with or without power, due to a blizzard, flood, accident or pandemic, for example.
Therefore, you should review your home preparedness today so that you can manage on your own for at least seven days!