Emergency shelters are erected for people who are suddenly rendered homeless due to a natural disaster or due to any other cause. The easiest and fastest emergency shelters that can be setup very fast are tents. International agencies like UNHCR, ICRC, etc have stocks of tents placed all over the world and are set up in case of a natural disaster occurring.

These tents are air lifted and set up in a safe place in the emergency area. These emergency shelters become known as tent cities as there can be hundreds of families living in these tent cities. Other basic facilities also have to be made available to people who live in emergency shelters. Water, food and sanitation are the foremost requirements of people who migrate to emergency shelters.

Other than this, they need clothes, bedding, utensils, and hygiene kits. People may come to the emergency shelter without any worldly possessions and not even a change of clothes or even shoes. People leave their homes because of an emergency and shift to an emergency camp. They just escape with their lives when faced with an emergency.

People come to an emergency-because they had to flee in panic. A number of people sustain injuries while escaping and the first thing that they need is medical-treatment. To provide medical-treatment in an emergency you have different types of emergency medical-treatment teams. In case of an emergency in a city, town or other populated area the paramedics are called in to provide the first step of medical treatment.

When people flee en-mass from a disaster, emergency teams have to be flown in, to provide medical treatment. The medical-treatment teams need medical supplies and facilities to treat the people. Medical treatment may be required where a disaster has occurred or a disease has spread, like the outbreak of bird flu, et cetera. In such cases the entire area is cordoned of, people in the area are quarantined and only medical emergency teams are allowed inside until the emergency is over.

Emergency-shelters and medical-treatment go hand in hand wherever emergencies occur. In fact, the medical treatment units are the first set of people who are sent in an emergency area. They have to fix people who have been injured by the emergency.

Emergency-shelters are temporary shelters that are setup to provide shelter to people. If the emergency is a drought, or war and people are going to stay for longer periods in emergency-shelters. Then they may need more than tents to stay in. In such cases, there are companies that make prefabricated houses, which can be erected fast and provide a better and safer shelter against the elements than tents. Governments and international organisations purchase and setup these emergency shelters. Governments of countries that are prone to disasters like China, keep emergency shelters in stock. They also have medical treatment teams on standby.

Providing emergency-shelters and medical treatment is what every country has to be prepared for. The level of preparedness cannot be predicted, as emergencies are unpredictable.