Natural disaster
Experimental estimate · v0.3Initial distress among people living in 37 reported displacement sites.
Distress in displacement sites
Broader flood event, same report. Source context
people in 37 sites
Approximate, assumption-based USU for the included experience. Deaths are a separate measure.
Reading the result
The shared flood template gives about 30.5 USU per person, or about 111,000 USU for this site population. The scope is narrow: it covers distress assigned to the 3,629 people in the reported displacement sites, not the full human impact of the floods.
This estimate covers the reported site residents only. A smaller result than another flood entry can reflect narrower population coverage, not a less severe disaster.
The duration and intensity assigned to displacement distress have the weakest evidence basis in this event list. They are a starting scenario, not observed cohort averages.
The calculation
30.5 USU per modeled course, before multiplying by the reported count. The calculation uses unrounded values; only the headline is rounded.
Intensity is assigned on a 0–10 scale and averaged over the whole elapsed course, including relief and sleep. Why divide by 47.25?
We assign the same 30-day initial course to each person in the selected flood-displaced cohort. Reports of continuing displacement and difficult living conditions support a multiweek scenario. None measures a 30-day cohort mean. This is a consistency choice, not evidence of equal recovery time or a month actually spent in a shelter. [S6] [S10] [S11] [S12]
WHO describes anxiety, sadness, sleep problems and other distress after emergencies. Assigned intensity 2 represents a modest whole-day average across the selected cohort, including relief and people with little distress. This provisional mapping to the pain reference is especially weak; WHO supplies no numeric conversion. [S7]
All flood entries use the same 30-day, intensity-2 course. The Nepal and Mozambique entries cover site or centre residents; the Brazil and Pakistan entries use broader displaced-population snapshots.
At 14 days and intensity 1, the result is about 0.03 million USU. At 60 days and intensity 3, it is about 0.33 million USU.
These are alternative input scenarios, not confidence intervals or bounds on all uncertainty. Some cross-condition orderings change under these choices. The headline uses the single shared template above.
Coverage
One initial distress course for each person in the reported displacement-site cohort, using the same duration and intensity as the other flood entries. People staying outside these sites are outside the calculation.
UNFPA Nepal reported 3,629 people in 37 displacement sites in its 4-9 September 2026 situation report. We use that fixed site population, not the much broader affected population, all people ever displaced, or a cumulative count of movements. The source does not measure person-days; a standard course is assigned to the selected cohort. Later changes in site occupancy do not revise this dated snapshot. [S11]
Injury and disease episodes, bereavement, later mental-health effects, distress outside the selected cohort and post-death loss.
Omitted experiences are unestimated, not known to be zero. This is not a complete event total or a guaranteed lower bound.
Whole representative courses are assigned to the source-defined cases or cohort. Course time can extend beyond the reporting dates. Individual trajectories, fatal-case truncation and a causal baseline are not reconstructed; no suffering after death is assigned.
Deaths remain separate
The same report gives 1,367 confirmed deaths across the broader flood event. These are not deaths among the selected 3,629 site residents. Missing people are not added to the death count; mortality is separate from USU. [S11]
USU estimates experienced suffering during lived time. The death count is shown alongside it and is not converted into USU.
Trace the estimate
Approximately 7.9 million people displaced and at least 1,700 deaths. Describes continuing disruption; no measured average duration or intensity.
3,629 people in 37 displacement sites and 1,367 deaths across the broader flood event. Site residents are a selected population, not all affected or displaced people.
Over 100,730 people in 112 temporary accommodation centres. We use 100,730 as the arithmetic anchor and preserve the qualifier. This report supplies no death count.
Continuing displacement and delayed returns support investigating a multiweek window, not a measured mean duration.
Qualitative basis for distress inclusion. Neither numeric intensity nor transfer from pain is established; conflict-specific disorder prevalence is not used.
Stipulated six-hour kidney-stone reference: 47.25 modeled intensity-hours, with linear weighting. This convention defines the unit; it is not a measured equivalence between conditions.
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