During the 2012–2016 drought in La Guajira, Colombia, child mortality rates rose to 23.4 out of 1000. Most of these children belonged to the Wayuu indigenous community, the largest and one of the most vulnerable in Colombia. At the municipal level, this study found a significant positive correlation between the average child mortality rate and households with a monthly income of less than USD 100, the number of people without access to health insurance, being part of the indigenous population, being illiterate, lacking sewage systems, living in rural areas, and large households with members younger than 5 years old and older than 65 years old. No correlation was found with households without access to a water source. The stepwise regression analysis showed that households with a monthly income of less than USD 100, no members older than 65 years old, but several children younger than 5 years old, account for 90.4% of the child mortality rate. This study concludes that, if inhabitants had had better incomes or assets, as well as an adequate infrastructure, they could have faced the drought without the observed increase in child mortality.

Floods are the natural hazards that are causing the most deaths worldwide. Flood early warning systems are one of the most cost-efficient methods to reduce death rates, triggering decisions about the evacuation of exposed population. Although previous studies have investigated the effect of human behaviours on evacuation processes, studies analysing a combination of behaviours, flood onset and warning timing are limited. Our objective is to explore how changes on the aforementioned factors can affect casualties. This is done within a modelling framework that includes an agent-based model, a hydraulic model, and a traffic model, which is implemented for the case study of Orvieto (Italy). The results show that the number of casualties is most impacted by people’s behaviour. Besides, we found that a delay of 30 min in releasing the warning can boost the number of casualties up to six times. These results may help managers to propose effective emergency plans.