Guest Post

The following is a guest post from a freelance writer who is looking to add to her writing portfolio. She prepared an article entitled "Third World Public Health Issues" for my site and included her by-line (with a link to her site) underneath it. She tried to come up with something that seemed like it would fit my audience as well as was something she knew enough about to write fairly confidently on. She welcomes your comments.


Third World Public Health Issues

Not many of us are aware of the health issues that face the poor, especially those who live in developing nations. We take basic facilities like running water, clean toilets, hygienic and regular meals, and a warm roof over our heads for granted while children are being born every second into conditions of squalor and poverty. Lack of sanitation and no access to even the most basic of amenities ensures that people are beset by diarrhea, malaria, HIV/AIDS, malnutrition, and other chronic health conditions. While it’s true that organizations, both public and private, from developed countries are doing their best to alleviate this state of affairs, there are various fundamental issues unique to third world countries that prevent any kind of aid from working effectively:

Lack of infrastructure: Aid can only do so much – it can help treat existing conditions and use vaccines to prevent the reoccurrence and spread of diseases. What it can’t do though is build enough toilets, arrange for clean drinking water, provide the children with access to education, or ensure that the poor get to eat healthy food. While there are a few aid programs dedicated to improving the basic infrastructure in villages, there’s not much improvement that they can bring about, because of bureaucracy issues.

Political red tape, corruption: Politicians are known to be a greedy lot; they’re only interested in lining their coffers and looting public money as long as they’re in office, little caring for the needs of the people in their constituencies. Most third world nations are governed by power and money hungry politicians who create as much red tape as they can when it’s a question of foreign aid. They end up taking a large part of the money as bribes in return for allowing the aid crew to do its job. With continuous situations like this, disillusionment creeps in and does nothing to improve the status of the poor.

Malnutrition: Children are born to undernourished mothers, so there’s no chance for them to grow up healthy. Most street children live off food waste scrounged from dumpsters or beg for a living. With no regular source of food, malnutrition is a major problem. For aid to tackle this issue, the root must be identified, which means people must be given access to jobs that allow them to earn a decent living so that they can continue to feed their families. This again depends on various local factors, not the least of which is the government.

No education: With no education to speak of, men and women are hardly aware of the dangers of eating off the streets, living in filthy conditions, having unprotected sex, and drinking unclean water. And even if they are, there’s not much they can do about it, not without money. The little money that comes their way is squandered by the men on alcohol and tobacco, with the women being abused if they oppose this habit.

For aid programs to be effective and achieve their goal, long term planning, combined with local effort, is a must.

This article is contributed by Sarah Scrafford, who regularly writes on the topic of Radiology Technician Classes. She invites your questions, comments and freelancing job inquiries at her email address: sarah.scrafford25@gmail.com.

Public Health Team Gives First Lesson for 300!

Webert, distributing toothbrushes.

Webert and Fritzner work in the girl’s home, taking names and doing general health exams.

In the children’s village, the team took down the names and ages of all the children living in each house, while at the same time, doing a general health exam of each child, noting who had scabies, ringworm etc.

The public health team giving their first public lesson to a group of nearly 300 children and adults after Sunday Mass. The topic was oral hygiene. Using posters, skits and even a monologue, the team emphasized the importance of taking care of your teeth and brushing twice a day. Everyone in attendance received a toothbrush and toothpaste.

By the end of the day, over 600 children and 20 adults received new toothbrushes and toothpaste.

Today is World AIDS Day. Today is dedicated to raising awareness of the AIDS pandemic caused by the spread of HIV infection. AIDS has killed more than 25 million people with an estimated 33.2 million people living with HIV making it one of the most destructive epidemics in recorded history. Despite recent, improved access to antiretroviral treatment and care in many regions of the world, the AIDS epidemic claimed an estimated 3.1 million (between 2.8 and 3.6 million) lives in 2005, of which more than half a million (570,000) were children.

The concept of a World AIDS Day originated at the 1988 World Summit of Ministers of Health on Programmes for AIDS Prevention. Since then, it has been taken up by governments, international organizations and charities around the world. (Wiki.com)

The following is a link if you’re interested in learning more about World AIDS Day and how to get involved in fighting HIV/AIDS around the globe. http://www.worldvision.org/content.nsf/getinvolved/hope-home

HIV/AIDS in Haiti

8,706,497: population of Haiti (2007 est.)110,000: Estimated number of people living with HIV/AIDS by the end of 2007

2.2%: Estimated percentage of adults (ages 15-49) living with HIV/AIDS by the end of 2007

53%: Estimated percentage of HIV cases that occured among women (ages 15-49) by the end of 2007

6,800: Estimated number of children (ages 0-15) living with HIV/AIDS by the end of 2007

7,500: Estimated number of deaths due to AIDS during 2007

Source
UNAIDS 2008 Report on the Global AIDS Epidemic. July 2008

Here are a few great sites if you’re interested in learning more about the demographics and epidemiology of diseases endemic to Haiti.

Globalhealthreporting.org
Kaisernetwork.org
Globalhealthfacts.org

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