This past week I was fortunate enough to be part of the Shot @ Life conference on Capitol Hill. Shot @ Life is a non profit organization that collaborates with the UN foundation, UNICEF and other NGO's to vaccinate children across the world. They currently focus on pneumonia, rubella, polio, and measles. As a developed nation, we very rarely consider the affects of these diseases because they have been eradicated from the United States. However, today we live in a rapidly globalizing world and a disease somewhere can become a disease anywhere.
It is extremely interesting to consider these easily vaccinate preventable diseases as an international disaster. It definitely depends on the situation. For example just a few decades ago polio was a rampant killer across the world which could be considered a disaster. Today polio only exists in three countries; Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Nigeria. Last year only 73 cases of polio were recorded. Shot @ life believes this could be the year when polio is eradicated from the earth as a whole.
These provided vaccinations also provide the opportunity to create valuable infrastructure, heath care organizations, and more viable jobs and living conditions for the people in the situation. Similar to the article we read on how in post disaster situations, previous rebel groups may sometimes cooperate and create a better situation then before, the disaster of preventable disease can be solved and subsequently lead to stabler communities.
Hi Alyson! Your approach of characterizing disease as a disaster is unique and very interesting! I question which category of disasters this would fall under- human made disaster, (definitely not what we would think of as environmental natural disasters), or a natural hazard increased by humans? Also, I wonder what the role of widespread disease has on risk, hazard, vulnerability, exposure, and manageability in the context of environmental deterioration. When you talk about vaccine-prevented diseases, I question where plant diseases and fungi fit in (how can plant diseases be caused and how do they exacerbate environmental degradation if they do? Can these plant diseases be considered disasters as well?)
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