Prehospital and Disaster Medicine (PDM) 26:4 has been posted to Cambridge Journals Online (CJO). Most of the articles from 26:5 can be viewed under the FirstView tab on PDM's webpage. PDM has a new online submission system through ScholarOne for submitting manuscripts to the journal. All submissions need to be uploaded to ScholarOne from the following link - http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/pdm.

WADEM has compiled an online photo album from the submitted photos. There have been several new photos uploaded to the album in recent weeks. Please click on the following link to view the album.

The Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (JAVMA) recently posted an article about the Veterinary Sessions held at the 17th WCDEM. It was the first time at a World Congress there has been a veterinary medicine track. The full text of the article can be accessed from the following link - http://www.avma.org/onlnews/javma/oct11/111001u.asp.

The 17th WCDEM was also featured in a column title "Ready or Not?" from the newsletter of the Emergency Nurses Association. To read the article, please click on the following link - http://www.wadem.org/documents/ena_newsletter_sept_2011.pdf.

The very successful 17th World Congress on Disaster and Emergency Medicine (WCDEM) closed on 3 June. The Congress hosted more than 1,600 participants from 57 countries. The 17th WCDEM was held in conjunction with the 14th Annual Meeting of the Chinese Society for Emergency Medicine.

In keeping with tradition, the Closing Ceremony featured a "passing of the flag" from the current WCDEM site to the upcoming one. Prof. Anthony Redmond, Dr. Judith Fisher, and Prof. Li Chengshung (pictured to the right) posed for a photo marking the transfer of the WCDEM from Beijing to Manchester in 2013.

With the scale and frequency of disasters increasing, the 17th WCDEM was more relevant then ever. This year alone marks one of the worst in terms of disasters – the earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear reactor issues in Japan; floods in Australia; earthquakes in New Zealand; and tornados in the southern United States. Research, experiences, and lessons learned from these recent events, and many others, were presented by delegates at the 17th WCDEM.

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