%0 Journal Article %A Yoshiko Iwai %A Sarah Holdren %A Leah Teresa Rosen %A Nina Y Hu %T Narrative trajectories of disaster response: ethical preparedness from Katrina to COVID-19 %D 2021 %R 10.1136/medhum-2021-012194 %J Medical Humanities %P medhum-2021-012194 %X While COVID-19 brings unprecedented challenges to the US healthcare system, understanding narratives of historical disasters illuminates ethical complexities shared with COVID-19. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina revealed a lack of disaster preparation and protocol, not dissimilar to the challenges faced by COVID-19 healthcare workers. A case study of Memorial Hospital during Hurricane Katrina reported by journalist-MD Sheri Fink reveals unique ethical challenges at the forefront of health crises. These challenges include disproportionate suffering in structurally vulnerable populations, as seen in COVID-19 where marginalised groups across the USA experience higher rates of disease and COVID-19-related death. Journalistic accounts of Katrina and COVID-19 offer unique perspectives on the ethical challenges present within medicine and society, and analysis of such stories reveals narrative trajectories anticipated in the aftermath of COVID-19. Through lenses of social suffering and structural violence, these narratives reinforce the need for systemic change, including legal action, ethical preparedness and physician protection to ensure high-quality care during times of crises. Narrative Medicine—as a practice of interrogating stories in medicine and re-centering the patient—offers a means to contextualise individual accounts of suffering during health crises in larger social matrices.No data are available. This is a narrative analysis of journalistic accounts using narrative medicine. There are no data associated with this manuscript. %U https://mh.bmj.com/content/medhum/early/2021/12/19/medhum-2021-012194.full.pdf