Set up personal and vehicle kits
Small kits go where people are: in each grab bag and each vehicle. They cover the first minutes of an injury and keep personal medicines with the person.
How
- Personal kit: a small first aid pouch, each person's medicines list, a few days of their own medicines if their clinician agrees, spare glasses, and a copy of their health page.
- Add a personal bleeding control item (tourniquet and gloves) for anyone who uses chainsaws or machinery, after training.
- Vehicle kit: a family first aid kit (contents in medical-11), a bleeding control kit, emergency blanket, water and a torch.
- Do not leave temperature-sensitive medicines in vehicles. Heat can reduce or destroy a medicine's effectiveness, and frozen insulin must not be used.
Do these first
Sources
- Anatomy of a First Aid Kit. American Red Cross, accessed 2026-11
- Build A Kit. Ready.gov (US FEMA), accessed 2026-11
- Safe Drug Use After a Natural Disaster. FDA, accessed 2026-11
- Information Regarding Insulin Storage and Switching Between Products in an Emergency. US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), accessed 2026-11