The Threat of Infectious Diseases to the Consequences of a Natural Disaster - Assignment Example

Question No. 1 A. Discuss the consequences of a natural disaster with reference to threat of Infectious diseases; possible causes, burden, and appropriate measures for control. Natural disasters are extreme, sudden events caused by environmental factors that injure people and damage property. Earthquakes, windstorms, floods, and disease all strike anywhere on the face of the earth, often without any warning. (Strahler & Strahler, 1973)They usually come at the least expected time thus increases the severity of destruction. As a result of disasters, people may be hurt or worst, killed, or they may even lose their homes and belongings. (Wright, 1979) I will discuss the most common of all the natural hazards, the flood (Schools Council (Great Britain). Geography 16-19 Project. & Fien, 1986). Flood is a spread of water in a submerging land and occurs when a body of water overflows onto dry land. Most commonly, it occurs when water from heavy rain, melted ice and snow or a combination of both exceeds the capacity of the river system, lake or ocean to where it runs. Its main cause is not due to weather disturbance but due to the distribution of human population near the water sources. As we all know, since the start of the civilization, human beings build their cities near a body of water for faster transportation and access to food and trade. A flood can also occur when a volcano erupted and it melts large amounts of ice and snow quickly. Not to mention, the increasing deforestation throughout the world. Although nature is usually blamed for the harm, the people are at least partly responsible for the presence of human activities in areas prone to the hazard of floods. Prevention is often aimed at containing floods with defenses, often increasing the potential damage in the long run. Nowadays, strategies to deal with floods more and more include evacuation strategies to avert damage. (Schools Council (Great Britain). Geography 16-19 Project. & Fien, 1986) It also has many hazardous effects to human life. It can be deadly most especially when they arrive without warning. Like any other natural disasters, it’s many adverse consequences are often anticipated but is never predictable. The worst effect of floods is on one’s health because of the threat of diseases you can acquire. Oftentimes, these diseases are more fatal than the original disaster. It is because flooding is associated with an amplified risk of infection. The major risk factor for outbreaks associated with flooding is the contamination of potable water facilities. Some of them are cholera, Leptospirosis, Malaria, Dengue, Yellow fever, Tetanus, the Common Cold, and sometimes Hepatitis A. Major Health epidemics are rare in the aftermath of disasters but some of them are so great that they can create perfect conditions for the spreading of the diseases. One instance is when the affected population is gathered in confined spaces such as evacuation centers. This condition can further enable the spread of certain epidemics. I will discuss the different diseases you can acquire through flood. I will also discuss their cause, effects, and ways of transmission, their treatment and prevention. I’ll start off with cholera. Cholera is one of the many illnesses flood can bring. Its spread is one of the main dangers following a natural disaster especially flood. It is an acute infection of the gut which causes chronic diarrhea and vomiting (Tonge & Quincey, 1985). This can lead to dehydration and at times, death. It can be spread through dirty water and food, which is the most common cause of sudden outbreaks. Although cholera is rarely spread directly from person to person, the resulting diarrhea allows the bacteria to spread under unsanitary conditions. It is most deadly after the disaster because there has no facilities for treatment of the disease. But then, you can easily treat it with oral rehydration salts to make up for the lost water in the body and also antibiotics. Although it is life-threatening, certain measures can be taken to avoid it. Simple sanitation is often enough to prevent it. Containing a cholera epidemic involves ensuring there are proper sanitation methods for disposing of dirt, a sufficient drinking water supply and fine food hygiene. Food should be cooked thoroughly and should not be contaminated by contact with raw foods, flies or filthy surfaces. In general, education and proper sanitation is more than enough to stop the spread of the epidemic. Another infectious disease that can be acquired through the flood is Leptospirosis. It is the only epidemic-prone infection which can be transmitted directly from impure water. The disease is usually transmitted to humans by allowing fresh water that has been contaminated by animal urine especially rats to come in contact with unhealed breaks in the skin, eyes or with the mucous membranes. This may happen by swallowing infected food or water or through skin contact (Terpstra, Adler, World Health Organization., & International Leptospirosis Society., 2003). The disease is not known to be spread from person to person and cases of bacterial propagation in convalescence are extremely rare in humans. Its symptoms could be high fever, diarrhea and vomiting. Leptospirosis treatment can be a complicated process. It is comprised of two main components. One is the suppressing the cause of the disease and the other is fighting possible complications. To suppress the cause, proper drainage could lessen the possibilities that you would be infected with the disease. In fighting the possible complications, the patient must undergo some treatment such as taking antibiotics. Improper treatment could reduce the survival rate of the patient. Next is the malaria. It is an infectious disease which is one of the most common health problems. Its symptoms include fever, shivering and vomiting. It is caused by mosquitoes. This epidemic is heightened after floods because of the standing water caused by heavy rainfall or overflow of rivers which can act as a breeding site for mosquitoes. Flooding may at first wash away the mosquitoes breeding site but it comes back when the water withdraw. Many steps can be taken to prevent the spread of malaria. It includes the use of mosquito nets which is probably the easiest and inexpensive way to avoid mosquito bites. It helps in keeping away mosquitoes from people and thus greatly reduces the infection and transmission of malaria. They may not be the perfect barrier but then along with the use of insecticides, it would be an easier task. Mosquito control is one effective way of reducing the risk of malaria and its burden and since flooding does not lead to an immediate major increase in mosquito numbers, it would be used as a preventive measure that would sure have an effect (Harrison, 1978). Another one is a disease like malaria that is also transmitted to humans by mosquitoes. Dengue is manifested by sudden fever and severe headache, muscle pains, vomiting, diarrhea and nausea. Same as the malaria, dengue has the same means of transmitting to human being. it basically is the same with malaria. Its only difference is its symptoms and the treatment of the illness. For treatments, the patient is encouraged to keep up oral intake, especially of oral fluids. To prevent the spread of this disease, eliminate or reduce the mosquito’s habitat. Public spraying for mosquitoes can help a lot in the prevention of dengue. Initiatives to eradicate pools of standing water such as flowerpots, old tires and others which can hold stagnant water have proven useful in controlling mosquito-borne diseases (Hotta, 1995). Yellow fever is a severe viral disease.(Strode, 1951) The yellow in the disease name refers to the jaundice that affects some patients. It is caused by certain breeds of mosquitoes. Human infection is begun after the deposition of viral particles through the skin in infected saliva. Its symptoms that arise include fever, muscle aches, headaches and backaches. It may also include bloody vomit. Later on, it may complicate into liver failure which causes the yellow skin color. Prevention of this disease could be vaccine shots which effectively protects the patient from further illness. Another is the clearing of breeding sites for mosquitoes, same as malaria and dengue. Next is tetanus. It is a medical term indicating a prolonged contraction of the muscle fibers. Common symptoms of it are lockjaw, difficulty in swallowing and muscle stiffness(DasGupta, 1993). Tetanus can be acquired not by stepping on rusty nails as we were led to believe but it can be acquired through stepping on a nail and in the process hurting yourself and that old nail is found on an ideal ground for breeding bacteria. So, floods can bring about many cases of tetanus because of the bacteria that can possibly inhibit those rusty nails you happen to step on after the flood. Its prevention however, can be done by proper immunization. Other infectious disease brought about by flood is common cold, the most common of all human diseases (Zhang & You). It is a mild viral infectious disease of the nose and throat. Symptoms can include sneezing, nasal congestion, runny nose, phlegmy throat, coughing, headache and tiredness. It can be transmitted from one person to another by droplets from cough and sneezes. The best way to prevent common cold is by avoiding direct contact to a sufferer, washing hands thoroughly and regularly and also by avoiding touching the face. Summing it up, flood can have devastating effect but it can be avoided by taking on preventive measures to ensure one’s safety. Lack of clean water, the suspension of public health programs, poor sanitation as well as population movement help all of these said illnesses to multiply. It is then likely to set up an early epidemic warning system, measures to control communicable diseases, a program for repairing key hospitals and primary care agencies which may have been hit by the disaster, water and sanitation measures and programs for ensuring necessary medical supplies are available. Ensuring uninterrupted provision of potable and safe drinking water is the most important preventive measure to be implemented following flooding, in order to reduce the risk of outbreaks of water-borne diseases. We also should practice good hygiene and safe food preparations. Frequent measures of flood control could consist of improving channels, building protective levees and storage reservoirs, and implementing programs of soil and forest preservation to delay and absorb runoff from storms. The sustainable and successful supervision of water resources demands a holistic approach - linking socio-economic growth with the protection of natural ecosystems and suitable management links between land and water uses. It is recognized that a river basin is a active system in which there are many interactions between land and water bodies. In the light of this, attempts are needed and should be tried to improve the functioning of the river basin as a whole rather than simply fixing local problems. So we must exert some effort on the management of these water resources. If we do all this, we can be certain that infectious diseases outbreak could be lessened if not prevented totally. Let us remember that floods, which if not managed wisely, can turn this life providing element into a demon, play a crucial role in the socio-economic development around the world. So let us all be vigilant in taking care of our environment to avoid these disasters. B. Comment on Australia's preparedness in any such event. How would you compare the recovery process from a natural disaster between a developed and a developing country? With all of these natural disasters occurring around the globe, I can say that Australia is very prepared when it comes to disasters that can strike them. How can I say that? Well, in fact, you can just look at the newspapers and you can easily tell how prepared they are when it comes to natural disasters (New Zealand. Earthquake Commission. & Centre for Advanced Engineering (New Zealand), 1995). In the recent years, Australia has had their share of calamities. In the face of these adversities, Australia remained to be resilient and have traditionally come together in times like these. With this attitude, they help reduce the impact of the disasters that come on weak population. I think that Australia never took for granted the fact that being prepared makes a hell of difference. Australia works in cooperation with international and domestic partners in improving their strategies on disaster preparedness. Since they know that their country have a wide range of natural disasters they can experience, they prepare for it. Even their remotest communities know what to do during these times. It helps when the entire population is bombarded with many disaster preparedness pamphlets and journals in different mediums. When you browse at the internet, you can see more than a dozen sites discussing disaster preparedness. Journals, and even newspapers, are full of reminders of what they should do when calamity strikes. It discusses how they can prevent the immediate effects of the calamity. They took advantage of the media who can easily reach even the remotest town. Their preparation for the striking of disaster involves many things. Prevention, preparedness, response and recovery rely upon the active partnership between all the spheres of government, NGO’s, and the whole community. With their economic growth and development and of course the way their government handles these calamities is a sure sign that they can handle individually the disaster reduction. They deploy several trained volunteers in every territory who operates the emergency service agencies. Each state and territory develops their own emergency and disaster management committees. On the other hand, the role of the federal government is more on providing guidance and support for the states and territories. They also provide the requested assistance in the event of a major emergency in which the resources of the state or territory are unavailable. Another role is that they are the ones who directed financial support to the states and territories. They also provide assessment, warning and monitoring services for the hazards. The NGO’s are the essential components in the response and relief operations and supporting of the communities in their recovery phase. Australia employs several tactics to be prepared thoroughly for a disaster. I can see that through their unity and joint efforts, they are always well prepared come the time of disasters. But unlike Australia, which is a developed country, there are some countries that don’t employ the same strategy. For developing countries, it is hard to be prepared for a natural disaster. Since developing countries, most especially in the Asia Pacific region are also vulnerable to a range of natural disasters, they also have to be prepared for them. But, it would be hard because of many reasons. First, developing countries doesn’t have the means to shell out calamity funds that easily. With their economic growth to consider, disaster preparedness wouldn’t be on the top of their priorities. Finding the means to find the money for their restoration would be difficult so they sometimes hope for other countries to help them. Developed countries, on the other hand, has the means to shell out the needed amount for the restoration of their country. Aside from funds, developing countries also lack the right strategies to disseminate information of how to act accordingly come the time of the disaster while developed country obviously employ these kinds of strategies. Needless to say, the government of the developing countries doesn’t have the active partnership of the different spheres in the government unlike Australia. So naturally, the recovery process would be more time-consuming and fund-draining. They would need the help of the developed countries extended to them. This doesn’t mean that the developing countries lack the unity that the developed countries have. Actually, it is the most admirable qualities of some developing countries. They still struggle to stand up after any calamity and all they need is the help and support from the developed countries they can get so that their recovery would be fast. Question No. 2 The Infectious Disease Policy: towards the production of health, debates if the direction of the public health should change in believing that the key to health is the elimination of diseases to the concept that the key to health should be based on the creation of health. According to them, public health should undergo social change since we are reconstructing our society today. It should go with the flow as it did during the Industrial Revolution. But what exactly is public health? What is its importance to us? Public health as defined is the fulfillment of the society’s interest that the people are healthy. Its aim is to generate organized community effort to prevent disease and promote health. But then, the purpose of public health does not conform to the way our medical structures are planned to control infectious diseases. So now, they are suggesting that we change the way of our thinking about public health and how we apply it in our society. Change in orientation, vision, purpose and practice is their argument. They believe that making an infectious disease policy can give public health a new meaning. It can broaden our perspectives about infectious diseases and can enable us to understand more fully the obstacles to policy and intervention. The development of this policy could make the control of the infectious diseases more flexible and incorporated that can be applicable to both the local and international communities. This concept can be the recognition of improved communication and cooperation between those concerned about the infectious disease control. The policy that they are pushing forward specifies intentions, sets goals, limits and defines choices and implies accountability over the concept of public health. It would necessarily affect all institutions – health care or not. The policy, instead of concentrating on developing guidelines for the management of specific disease with emphasis on its treatment and cure, would concentrate on the perception of alternative structures which are not generally perceived. It moves beyond the biomedical model to include several factors like social, economic and environmental factors which also affect the controlling of infectious diseases. Current models for disease control tend to focus on short-term goals which are the development of guidelines for certain illnesses, putting emphasis on the treatment and cure. On the other hand, the proposed model focuses on long term goals which are the production of health. Current model only views the health factor alone can be relevant to the control of infectious diseases while the proposed model take under consideration other factors such as social, economic and environmental factors. One of these is disease specificity. I agree that we should change our ways regarding this factor. We should explore and search for the commonality of certain diseases and consider them during research. Maybe in doing so, we would learn why these commonalities exist and can help in the disease control which could have direct impact on the community and individuals. Not only would it save us money but it would also make certain that we didn’t miss an opportunity in learning more of what we can do to control these diseases effectively. Verticality Next is the verticality. I don’t really agree that it should undergo change. It is because these specific measures taken such as the drug supply, dedicated staff and funding certainly helps in the control of the diseases. And what made you say that it only takes on the primary endpoints of disease control? With the given examples like malaria and others, vaccination or medication can be the only cure and you could always take on some other preventive measures. Standardization The issue about standardization however, has my agreement. The measures they put up to prevent the further spread of the diseases have not been proven locally. Yes, it may work at some places but you cannot be sure of them all. Thus, standardization should be avoided. The measures being put up are often not flexible to other places due to some circumstances thus may not work. The disease control that they should implement should have universal effect and should be modified according to the community’s own context. Product/target-driven Next is the product-given target, which often drives the disease control. Its main objective is to have specific cures to diseases. They want to banish totally other infectious diseases given that they have appropriate technologies to do it. However, the paper disagrees because they said it is just waste of time and resources because it is entirely possible. Furthermore, they said that it would only damage the credibility of the medical personnel involved. I don’t agree with them first and foremost because the total eradication of the diseases should be our main objective. With the developing technology today, it would not be too long that we will develop medicine to cure the diseases. After all, we should always hope for the best and make the best out of the developments taking place. Short termism and competition between programmers Up next is the short termism and competition between programs. I agree with their argument simply because it is wrong. There should never be competition between programs for the disease control. Every disease should be given enough funding without the need to cancel a disease control program. And we should also not cut short the research of a program just because it doesn’t have much result. I also agree that we should not limit the infectious disease control program as the sole responsibility of the health sector. We must bear in mind that there are many factors which can affect the spread of the diseases which would probably be connected outside the health sector. We couldn’t say that the factors that are outside the health sector don’t have any impact on the disease control. We should consider all the possibilities and not limit ourselves to the health sector factors only. Biomedicine and focus on the individual Another is the biomedicine and the focus on the individual. The individual is also a factor to consider for the disease control however, it focuses entirely on the individual and sometimes they wouldn’t have the same behavior always. This approach was criticized when it became evident that if the person is willing to change his behavior, it would be dependent on his ability to change. It would be hard to understand that since they always view the behavior with isolation from the totality of conditions of normal life. Changing perceptions in public health To change the public perception of public health, there are seven key factors which encourage a change of the said perspective of public health. I agree that with these factors, we can understand more the ways of health and disease with regards to social and economic factors. These factors would support the perception of public health in all dimensions of our society, may it be, social, economical, political or environmental. Understanding income inequality and its relation to health First, we must all understand that income inequality has an effect to the public health, not only the physical being, but also our emotional being. Building social cohesion, which will lead the people to value unity and equality, will create a happy community. Encouraging the use of qualitative data in the biomedical discourse Second, it is encouraged the use of qualitative measures in biomedical discourse. It can help the social scientists in their role to raise the awareness of the public on certain diseases. They could help in determining some causes of illnesses that were due to social factors. Contextualizing ‘risk’: social vulnerability and (other) social factors in disease transmission Third, concepts like social vulnerability, further highlights the roles social scientist play in the health sector. Social vulnerability highlights the importance of the social factors which makes some individuals more susceptible to infection than others. The shifting of “risk” to “vulnerability” can cause the acceleration of the spread of epidemic. It shows the ways on which social inequality, discrimination, violence, oppression and exploitation facilitate. Re-focusing health promotion and education Fourth, infectious disease education can benefit greatly from the models which focus on collective empowerment and community mobilization. Developing resilience and strength from the community can be acquired through collective empowerment through education which takes action against oppressive forces. Building (on) community capacities/existing knowledge Fifth, we should also bear in mind that the public health officials should recognize that they have limit on what they could control. For example, if the culture of one population which has an outbreak of disease believes that they would not be fully healthy when they do not regain the control of their health and other aspect of their lives, health officials must learn to respect that belief. Creating multidisciplinary and inter-sectoral collaborations Sixth, we should give utmost importance on bridging institutional and academic discipline when the need to address complexity arises. Working through these disciplines, will bring many insights to assist in providing an alternative approach of knowing the root cause of the illness. A more coordinated approach of addressing facets of health and well-being, which cross-cut individual diseases, would be more accepted rather than reducing health to its lowest denominator. Let us always remember that, each of the different academic disciplines has a unique contribution to make. This would also help us to face the scientific uncertainties in biomedicine with utmost honesty and humility. Remembering and incorporating the principles of ethics and human rights Lastly, remember and incorporate principles of ethics and human rights in public health. It shows that ethics help in the development of more appropriate public health policies. This time of the millennium would give us reason to evaluate health care and assess the progress made on the public health and the disease control. Reference: DasGupta, B. R. (1993). Botulinum and tetanus neurotoxins : neurotransmission and biomedical aspects. New York: Plenum Press. Harrison, G. (1978). Mosquitoes, malaria and man : a history of the hostilities since 1880. London: Murray. Hotta, S. (1995). Dengue and related arboviruses. Kobe, Japan: Yukosha Printing House. New Zealand. Earthquake Commission., & Centre for Advanced Engineering (New Zealand). (1995). Wellington after the quake : the challenge of rebuilding cities : proceedings of a conference held in Wellington, New Zealand, 27-29 March 1995. Wellington: Earthquake Commission ; Centre for Advanced Engineering. Schools Council (Great Britain). Geography 16-19 Project., & Fien, J. (1986). Studying natural hazards. Harlow: Longman. Strahler, A. N., & Strahler, A. H. (1973). Environmental geoscience : interaction between natural systems and man. Santa Barbara, Calif.: Hamilton Publ. Co. Strode, G. K. (1951). Yellow fever. New York ;: McGraw-Hill Book Company Inc. Terpstra, W. J., Adler, B., World Health Organization., & International Leptospirosis Society. (2003). Human leptospirosis : guidance for diagnosis, surveillance and control. Geneva: World Health Organization. Tonge, N., & Quincey, M. (1985). Cholera and public health. London: Macmillan Education. Wright, J. D. (1979). After the clean-up : long-range effects of natural disasters. Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage Pubns. Zhang, Z., & You, Y. Shang han guan zhu ji : 8 juan (Kan ben. ed.). Guangzhou: Hui ji cang.  Read More