Disaster preparation is an extensive and potentially expensive business. Distilled to materials alone, nearly any advice on how to stock for the unexpected tends to include lengthy material bullet lists. Comprehensive lists might look great on paper, but are they realistic compared to the limits of a typical families’ personal resources?

Let’s look at a single item as suggested in CERT UNIT 1: DISASTER PREPAREDNESS
PARTICIPANT MANUAL, 1-22: Water.

Keep in mind that a normally active person needs to drink at least 2 quarts of water each day. Hot environments and intense physical activity can double that requirement. Children, nursing mothers, and ill people will need more.
Store 1 gallon of water per person per day (2 quarts for drinking, 2 quarts for food preparation and sanitation).*
Keep at least a 3-day supply of water for each person in your household.

Seems simple enough, until one begins to do the math. Following the above guidelines a family of four would need to keep twelve gallons of water on hand at all times, making sure to replenish the supply at regular intervals. Do you have the ten or so square feet needed to spare? Can your drywall-mounted shelves withstand one hundred pounds?

What about poorer families? Those who do not have space or money to spare on day-to-day resources, let alone extra water jugs? Moreover, these same families are typically more vulnerable to disasters in general. As an alternative, single step filtration straws could offer drinking water for a lesser expenditure of space, money, and time.

All the above merely covers water, arguably the easiest necessity to acquire. I would suggest looking at all areas of disaster preparation not just from the disaster itself, but also from the standpoint of limited availability. This article lacks the necessary scope or research to back up the concerns presented, but I hope to invoke some discussion and further examination. Preparation guidelines tailored more to the limits of its target audience might be less than ideal, but they would be a vast improvement over the nothing that may result from more lofty expectations.