Is Your 72-Hour Emergency Kit Missing Your Medications?

Britain spent late October telling every household to keep three days of food and water at home, and store shelves responded almost immediately. In Canada, the advice has been the same for years, and the real question is how many of us have actually followed it.

Public Safety Canada confirmed to CBC News that its longstanding advice has not changed, and that every household should be ready to take care of itself for a minimum of 72 hours during an emergency. The reminder came after the British government launched a national campaign urging people to stock bottled water and food that will not spoil. For most families, a 72-hour emergency kit is mostly a grocery run, and the part people forget is the one that matters most for their health.

Key takeaways

Public Safety Canada says every household should be able to look after itself for at least 72 hours, and calls that a minimum.

Britain's new Be Ready campaign asks households to keep three days of supplies, and some retailers reported a jump in sales afterward.

Get Prepared recommends at least two litres of drinking water per person per day, food that needs no cooking, a flashlight, a radio, and a first aid kit.

Emergency experts quoted by CBC suggest preparing for longer than three days, since help may not reach everyone in the first week.

Daily prescriptions, inhalers, insulin, and powered medical devices are the items most likely to turn a disruption into a health problem.

What did Britain's Be Ready campaign ask for?

The British campaign, called Be Ready, launched in late October and asks households to keep three days of supplies, including food that will not spoil and bottled water. Officials warned that cyberattacks and severe weather could disrupt essential services. CBC reported that some British retailers saw spikes in sales of basic goods after the launch.

Canada's message is older and far less dramatic. Zarah Malik, a spokesperson for Public Safety Canada, told CBC that Canadians have been encouraged for many years to be ready to care for themselves and their households for at least 72 hours.

Why do experts say to plan for longer than three days?

Severe weather keeps delivering reminders of why this matters. Recent years have brought mass evacuations from wildfires and floods, and long power outages after ice storms have left households in Quebec and Ontario in the dark for days. Scott Cameron, co-founder of Emergency Management Logistics Canada, told CBC that Canadians should be paying more attention to preparedness. He said the bigger gap is local capacity to carry communities beyond the first 72 hours.

Another emergency management expert told CBC that people should plan for the possibility that nobody can reach them during the first week, and keep a grab-and-go bag ready in case of evacuation. Planning for longer than three days makes sense, because Public Safety Canada itself calls 72 hours a minimum. Restoring services or reaching everyone can take more time in some areas. None of this is panic talk, and it follows the same logic as a smoke detector, which you install hoping you never need it.

What does Get Prepared tell you to pack?

The honest self-test is simple: whether your household could manage until the end of the week if the power and water went out tonight. For most of the checklist, the answer is a single trip to the grocery store. Get Prepared's basic emergency kit list starts with at least two litres of drinking water per person per day and food that needs no fridge or cooking. It adds a manual can opener, a flashlight, batteries, a wind-up or battery radio, a first aid kit, some cash in small bills, and a copy of your emergency plan.

How do you cover daily medications in an emergency?

The item that trips up households in a real emergency is rarely canned soup, and it is usually medicine. If anyone in your home takes daily medications, uses an inhaler, injects insulin, or relies on a powered medical device, a three-day disruption becomes a health problem long before it becomes an inconvenience.

A good 72-hour emergency kit includes several days of essential medicines, an up-to-date list of everyone's prescriptions and doses, and a plan for anything that needs refrigeration or power. Our guide to what your pharmacist wishes you knew before mixing medications is a good companion for that list. Our piece on medications that change how your body handles extreme weather shows why some prescriptions need extra planning. Our printable medication list template gives you somewhere to write it all down.

Build the kit gradually. Add a case of water and a few extra cans to your next grocery run instead of buying everything in one expensive trip.

Gather the basics in one place. Dig the flashlight and radio out of the junk drawer and store everything where every person in the house can find it.

Write down your medication list tonight. List every medicine, dose, and prescriber for each person, since it costs nothing and helps in every emergency.

Ask your pharmacist about refill timing. Pharmacists can often help you time refills so you are never down to your last few pills. Pharmacies handle more of this directly than they used to, as our guide to the pharmacist's expanding role explains.

Plan for medicines that need cold or power. Ask your doctor or pharmacist how to store insulin or other fridge items during an outage, and arrange a backup for powered devices.

Frequently asked questions

What should be in a 72-hour emergency kit in Canada?

A 72-hour emergency kit starts with at least two litres of drinking water per person per day and food that needs no cooking, according to Get Prepared. Add a can opener, flashlight, batteries, radio, first aid kit, cash, and your emergency plan. Then add several days of daily medicines and a written list of prescriptions for each person.

How much water do you need for three days?

Get Prepared recommends at least two litres of drinking water per person per day, so a household of four needs at least 24 litres for three days. It also suggests two more litres per person per day for cooking and cleaning if you can store it. Small bottles are easier to carry if you have to leave home.

How can I keep extra medication for emergencies?

Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about timing refills so you always have a few days in hand, and ask whether an emergency supply is possible for anything essential. Keep medicines in their original labelled containers, check expiry dates when you check your kit, and store a written list of every medication and dose with your supplies.

Your next step

If your emergency plan has a medication-shaped hole in it, that is a quick conversation to have this month. The Medimap Health Hub has more practical health guides, and you can find a family doctor near you to sort out the one part of your kit the grocery store cannot sell you.

Disclaimer: This article is for general information only and is not medical advice. It does not replace a conversation with a doctor or other qualified health professional who knows your history. If you think you are having a medical emergency, call 911 or go to the nearest emergency department.