Insurance for When FEMA Fails

he towns and cities dotting the Mississippi River have been a commercial spine of the American heartland for years, and for just as long have had to reckon with the sometimes violent ups and downs of the weather. In the past decade, however, they’ve been walloped by an unprecedented run of disasters. There were record droughts in 2012, which caused $35 billion in losses in the upper Midwest by curbing shipping and farm production, and record floods in 2019, which caused $6.2 billion in damage. In that time, they’ve also been hit by several hurricanes and periodic smaller droughts.

In theory, the federal government is supposed to step in after natural disasters and help municipal governments rebuild. But increasingly, the disaster relief checks aren’t arriving from Washington. Because of the sheer damage and number of storms, and the increasing frequency of floods that spark new spending requests, the federal bureaucracy is overwhelmed and an ever-polarized Congress less agile about responding. Some towns can’t afford to rebuild without those checks—so they don’t…

Natural Disasters Won’t Stop Just Because There’s a Pandemic: How We Can Be Prepared

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues unabated in the United States, state and county emergency management agencies are taking extra precautions to reduce coronavirus risks faced by people evacuating their homes because of hurricanes, wildfires, and other natural disasters.

Likewise, physicians and hospitals — who treat millions of Americans for seasonal influenza each year — will have to face the prospect that each cough or sniffle could be something much more than the flu…