Friday, June 24, 2005
Plagues strike Iraq as doctors flee
Via Chris Floyd, an article in the Japan TimesUnending health disaster for Iraqi kids
Some bullet points:
* Iraq used to have a problem with childhood obesity. Today, at 7.7 percent, Iraq's child malnutrition rate is roughly equal to that of Burundi, an African nation ravaged by more than a decade of war. It is far higher than the rates in Uganda and Haiti..
* Lack of dependable electricity and shortages of potable water throughout the country have led to ... outbreaks of cholera and typhoid fever, particularly in southern Iraq.... [and has] probably been the cause of an outbreak of hepatitis particularly lethal to pregnant women.
* the destruction of the refrigeration systems needed to store vaccines have rendered the vaccine supply virtually useless
* 10 percent of Baghdad's 32,000 doctors have left the country or have stopped working
* 25 percent of primary school-age children do not go to school
It's very hard to sell people on how how wonderful the future will be when the present is this bad.
More blogs about politics.
