Living on borrowed time!

 

When a tsunami, cyclone or earthquake hits the country, there is little the nation can do until the event plays itself out on our shores. We can just hope for the best! Have we prepared ourselves and the community well enough--heading for higher pieces of land, stocking up on food, water and other necessities, planning for temporary shelter, etc. etc? In other words, many natural disasters can and must be prepared for. Leaving everything to the last minute is a recipe for a greater disaster.

J. Roughan

13 January 2011

Honiara    

However, there are some disasters which are rarely forecasted on the radio or written about in newspapers. These are what we can call the 'silent disasters' which have a habit of sneaking up on us and literally killing many in a community. One such disaster has already claimed dozens and dozens of lives PNG and in this new year has already sickened almost 300 sick people in Port Moresby. It has an excellent chance of hitting us here as well. It's the cholera epidemic! 

 

In Haiti, for instance, more than 3,000 people have already died from the cholera epidemic which hit that poor island after the devastating earthquakes of January 2010. Its an epidemic that is far from over and the country is bracing itself for many more of its citizens to die. PNG recently received a helping hand from mainland China with a gift of several hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight this disease.

 

Cholera, a highly infectious disease features watery diarrhea, vomiting and cramps which can lead to death within hours especially among young children. One of the best preparations against this kind of disaster getting a foothold in groups of people is plenty of clean water, proper sanitation and taking care of solid waste. These are the very things that Honiara and most villages are in terribly short supply.

 

Honiara's new city council's top priority is to increase the salaries of its workers. That is a solid idea since many of Honiara's longest serving workers find themselves at the bottom end when it comes to monthly salaries. But not far from that payment priority must be doing something about the city's poor public health track record over the past ten years. Truly Honiara's citizens 'live on borrowed time'! 

 

Anyone staying in town has a first hand knowledge of the shocking state of our water supply. Add to that serious health condition is the fact that the Solomons only city does not have a single public toilet, its record on collecting rubbish from its 70,000 inhabitants has been dismal and its handling of solid waste leaves much to be desired. Each of these serious problems acts as an open invitation to the cholera disease to take hold and produce a lethal epidemic which would certainly overpower No. 9's ability to stop it. 

 

Currently we are sitting in the midst of a 'silent disaster' which could hit us at any moment. Cyclones, floods, earthquakes, etc. are beyond our  power to stop. All we can do is make the damage they will cause a bit less by proper preparation. But a disaster like cholera is some thing quite different. We can actually stop this disease in its tracks, before it has a chance to take hold, not by hoping for miracles, but by strengthening the basics of ordinary city life: insure a clean, abundant water supply, pick up people's rubbish on a daily basis and take care of the city's solid waste..

 

But one of the greatest defenses against a killer disease like cholera, however, has been totally forgotten by Honiara authorities for more than 10 years now. It is the city's duty to take care of human waste, to have a number of public toilets scattered around the town. Currently I know not a single public toilet that is working anywhere in town. 

 

Of course public toilets are an expensive proposition! People don't use them correctly. They waste too much water! City workers don't want to have anything to do with cleaning them! Etc, etc. Public toilets don't come cheaply. But try cholera! See how cheap that is. PNG has already lost dozens and dozens of its citizens to this dreaded disease which is preventable.

 

Please read what I'm proposing to Honiara's newest elected members to plan to do in this matter of public toilets in my column next week. Can the city make public toilets less expensive, in fact, a money spinner? What is your answer to the fact that we are 'living on borrowed time!'