Analyze

Lead Hazard

karishmakkhanal
Annotation of
In response to

WHAT (& WHAT FOR): Lead is a metal often found in pipes, and in old paint (before it was banned in paint in the late 1970s). Before 1996, lead also found in vehicle fuel resulting in  soil contamination in many communities from both paint dust and vehicle pollution. 

HEALTH IMPACT: Lead is a neurotoxin and is known to have no safe blood lead level in children. 

Has been linked to:

  1. Brain swelling, anemia, seizures, renal failure, reduced IQ, and ADHD

  2. Damages brain development in children

  3. Connected to behavioral problems like aggression and bullying, and internalizing problems such as depression and anxiety 

LOCAL IMPACT: Recent research in Santa Ana has shown that there is a disproportionately impact of solid lead contamination crisis on lower income, people of color communities. 

POSSIBLE RESPONSES: There are many ways to respond to lead contamination:

  1. Providing special health care for children with high blood lead levels, and investigating possible sources of lead exposure in homes, daycares and school, playground, etc.

  2. Implement strict housing policies where landlord and city housing officials are required to have lead inspections of homes for lead paint hazards (especially in low income, people of color communities)

  3. Requiring a minimum reduction standard for lead paint in older homes 

  4. Requiring blood lead level test as part of the routine check up for children (extremely important for children in low-income housing)

Authority and Trust

ntanio
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In response to

Reading Amanda Windle's briefing note I was struck by the question of trust and authority, particularly its absence, and the challenges that raises for crafting a communications strategy for The Simon Community and, by extension, other communities.

In watching the US Senate Panel question public health experts, the inherent distrust toward science and scientists by many republican senators and Lt Governors remains alarming. Conversely Goldman Sach's recently issued a report that wearing masks could save the US economy a 5% hit to the GDP. If this report has an impact, will it signal that economists are more trustworthy that public health officials, or simply that monetary value is the only value that counts in COVID communications. 

I am thinking about the interplay of these differing scales of authority and trust and how difficult it is for individuals, families and local communities and care groups to make sense of the competing messages in order to craft a reasonable, sensible strategy for negotiating risk.

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Jacob Nelson
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In response to

The main findings of the article are that the relationship between natural disasters and communicable diseases is not as much due to dead bodies or high trauma as it is to population displacement and a lack of preparredness of the local governing body for the disaster and the crowding of survivors that follows a disaster as this

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Jacob Nelson
Annotation of
In response to

1: Crowding is shown to be common in displaced populations, and local overpopulation/crowding often facillitates the transmittion of disease

2: Natural disasters that do not cause a displacement of a population are rarely associated with disease outbreaks

3: There is little or no evidence that dead bodies, as some believe, pose a epidemic risk for a population of survivors after a disaster has struck

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Jacob Nelson
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In response to

"The risk for commuicable disease transmission after disasters is associated primarily with the size and characteristics of the population displaced, specifically the proximity of safe water adn functioning latrines, the nutritional status of the displaced population, the level of immunuty to vaccine-preventable diseases..., and the access to healthcare services"

"...natural disasters (regardless of type) that do not result in population displacement are rarely associated with outbreaks"

"When death is directly due to the natural disaster, human remains do not pose a rise for outbreaks"

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Jacob Nelson
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In response to

Emergency response is addressed in a broad sense of the major risk factors associated with a natural disaster and epidemics. The main points they make are that preparedness, with a focus on availability of safe water and primary healthcare services, along with surveillance for the beginnings of an epidemic, are necessessay for a strong response to a disaster situation   

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Jacob Nelson
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In response to

This article has been referenced in a wide variety of emergency medicine journal articles, ranging from flood protocols, use of cell phones in disaster enviroments, earthquakes and medical complications, to the costs of disaster consequences. Many of the articles referencing this paper appear to go into greater depth for some of the epidemics and diseases that were touched on in the research article. These include hepatitis E, Leptospirosis, cholera, and tetanus.

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Alexi Martin
Annotation of
In response to

The object of the study is the evidence in an increase of various types of epidemics (cholera, malaria, menigitis, tetnus, etc) due to displacement of a populatoin from a natural diasaster. Examples of natural disasters discussed include- hurricanes, cyclones, earthquakes and flooding. Despite popular belief (and scientific evidence) deaths due to natural diasters do not spread diasese; unless cause of widespread infection is due to contaminated water sources, malnutrition, residing in a third world country,access to healthcare and adequate bathroom facilities. These points are supported through statistics from the past twenty or more years.