Medication Planning: Where to Start
A short pointer to the medication section: what to ask your pharmacist or doctor, and where to find official guidance.
Medicines need more care than other supplies. Full guidance is in the medication section. The essentials are:
- Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about keeping extra supply. They know what is safe and possible for you.
- Keep a paper list of medicines, conditions and allergies, plus your doctor’s and pharmacy’s numbers.
- Ask ahead about refrigerated medicine, and about what to do if it warms up in an outage.
- Never ration, stretch or change a prescription without medical advice.
Ready.gov and the Red Cross both ask you to make a plan with your doctor before an outage. The Red Cross suggests a 1-month supply in a child-proof container, and Canada.ca suggests medication to last a couple of weeks. What is possible varies by medicine, insurance and local rules, so ask.
If someone relies on powered equipment, see planning power for medical devices.
Checklist
0 of 6 ticked
Ask 0/3
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Everything on this list is ticked. Check it again when you rotate your supplies.
Where to buy
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Waterproof pouch for document copies
SentrySafe: SentrySafe Fire and Water Resistant Portable Bag with Zipper, FBWLZ0SSC
A zippered bag sold as fire and water resistant, for keeping IDs, insurance papers and a paper medication list together.
Sources
- American Red Cross: Power Outage Safety Checklist (PDF) https://www.redcross.org/content/dam/redcross/get-help/power-outage/EN_Power-Outage-Safety-Checklist.pdf
- FEMA/Ready.gov: Be Prepared for a Power Outage (PDF) https://www.ready.gov/sites/default/files/2024-03/ready.gov_power-outage_hazard-info-sheet.pdf
- Canada.ca: Emergency kits https://www.canada.ca/en/services/policing/emergencies/preparedness/get-prepared/emergency-kits.html
- Public Health Agency of Canada: Pandemic flu, be prepared https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/diseases/flu-influenza/pandemic-flu.html
- PreparedBC: Resources for People with Disabilities (PDF) https://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/public-safety-and-emergency-services/emergency-preparedness-response-recovery/embc/preparedbc/preparedbc-guides/preparedbc_emergency_preparedness_for_people_w_disability.pdf
Updated November 9, 2026