To the Editor: The article by Haug and colleagues on household food stockpiling is a useful contribution to a neglected aspect of disaster planning.1 However, rather than providing a guide to what foods should be stockpiled, it may be more valuable to encourage families to increase the amount and rotation of the non-perishables they currently purchase. The authors seek to promote a balanced nutritional diet, but encouraging a family to continue their usual purchasing patterns when stockpiling for a pandemic or other disaster is a simpler, more sustainable, and possibly more effective way to promote household food stockpiling. We must assume that the family currently survives, for better or worse, on their current food purchase pattern.

While the article states that supermarket stocks will become depleted within 2–4 weeks, it is likely that stocks would become significantly depleted at an individual store level within 2–3 days of the last truck delivery, particularly if panic stockpiling occurs. How long interruptions to the food supply chain last will depend on the nature of the disaster, but the Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing recommends that people have “enough fluids and food on hand to last you and your family a week.”2 It does not provide guidance on how much water is required per day.

This is an important issue, as mains water could be unavailable within hours to days of electricity supply outages, because electricity is required to pump water into elevated water reservoirs to maintain water pressure. People may be unaware of their daily fluid requirements and may run out of water and other potable fluids before they run out of food. The US Health and Human Services recommends a 2-week food and water stockpile (“one gallon of water per person per day”), which is roughly equivalent to four litres per person per day.3 A random household survey in the Hunter Region of New South Wales after a storm-related disaster in June 2007 revealed that over 80% of households had enough non-perishable food for 3 days, but less than 40% had enough stored drinking water for 3 days (Hunter New England Health, unpublished data).

Community continuity planning should be based on an understanding of baseline household food and water reserves, and household capacity and willingness to stockpile across all social strata. Governments should actively promote household stockpiling and identify strategies to bridge the shortfall in households unable to stockpile.

In reply: Dalton et al have raised several important points for discussion. They suggest that an adequate food “lifeboat” can be procured by simply encouraging a family to continue their usual purchasing patterns. Unfortunately, accumulating non-perishable items in this way would be a fast route to certain nutritional deficiency. It is the perishable items — fruit and vegetables, bread, meat and dairy products — that supply the bulk of micronutrients in modern food supplies. Within a few short months, an individual relying on usual pantry supplies could be suffering from acute deficiencies of vitamin C, and folate and other B vitamins. Babies conceived during this period would be at risk of neurological defects.

We agree that an important issue is the possibility of failure of the mains water. Indeed, many of the foods in our list require water for cooking (rice, pasta etc). Rainwater tanks and the ability to sterilise water by gas heating or chemical means may be lifesavers. We agree that governments should be actively promoting appropriate stockpiling in homes, places of employment and in areas of essential infrastructure.