Introduction
In 2020, cholera is not as dangerous as it was a hundred or two hundred years ago. Much more people have access to clean water; sewage is rarely discharged into the same bodies of water from which people drink. Wastewater treatment plants and water supply are on a completely different level, with several degrees of purification. However, in some countries, outbreaks of cholera still occur. One of the latest cholera epidemics to date began in Haiti in 2010. Only in the past 12 months, no new cases have been reported (Kushner, 2020). However, two more years are still needed to declare the population cholera-free.
Cholera is an acute intestinal infection caused by bacteria of the Vibrio cholerae species. Vibrio cholerae lives in dirty water and contaminated food. The disease spreads, usually in epidemics, provoking a rapid loss of fluid in the body and varying degrees of dehydration, even death. In total, more than 800,000 people were infected, during peak periods, up to 200 people fell ill per day (Agbedahin, 2019). The country is home to 9.8 million people; that is, cholera affected almost 10% of the population and killed 10,000 people (Agbedahin, 2019). Moreover, Vibrio cholerae itself in the first days of the outbreak turned out to be more virulent for people than after a month and a half. Up to 10% of cholera patients admitted to the hospital in the first 48 hours after the onset of the outbreak died, but in early December, this figure dropped to 1.4% (Agbedahin, 2019).
Relevant Cultural, Social, and Political Factors Related to Haiti Cholera Epidemic
Cholera is a disease that is closely linked to inequality. It primarily affects and kills the poorest and most disadvantaged people without access to clean water and sanitation. Farmer’s research into Haiti’s experience has revealed two leading causes of suffering rooted in the country’s colonial and postcolonial history – political violence and high rates of infection (Farmer 1992 as cited in Mattingly & Throop, 2018). Farmer’s approach was to provide a simple list of objective social factors contributing to the spread of infectious diseases. The researcher insists that it is social inequality around the world that is the main reason for the emergence of new and the return of old infections. In fact, inequality is not only a social factor but also a medical one. Where this factor exists, there are always conditions for the spread of pathology.
Haiti has already become a democracy with a popularly elected president, but democracy has not brought relief from suffering for the people of the country. The reason is that Haiti does not just continue to be one of the poorest countries in the Third World. It is a state where the legacy of centuries of slavery, racism, and gender inequality is embedded in all social institutions and everyday experience forms.
Cholera is most common in regions with high population densities, poor sanitation, and low water quality. Typical risk areas are urban slum areas that lack even basic infrastructure and internally displaced persons and refugee camps where water quality and sanitation are inadequate. In terms of the climatic conditions that contributed to the emergence of the epidemic in the region, it must be said that the spread of the disease was facilitated by the unsanitary conditions in which a significant part of the population was forced to live after the devastating earthquake.
In the fight against cholera in Haiti, international global control of the disease is essential. In December 2016, the UN General Assembly approved a strategy to combat cholera in Haiti and called on states to provide the resources necessary to implement it (Mika, 2020). Following this strategy, the work was carried out in two directions: first, to intensify efforts to treat and reduce cholera cases, and second, to provide material assistance to victims of cholera who fell ill as a result of the outbreak of the epidemic in 2010. For its implementation, hundreds of millions of US dollars were mobilized in both directions.
Besides, international activism has accompanied the uncovering of the original cause of the cholera epidemic in Haiti. It has been repeatedly suggested that peacekeepers from Nepal, where cholera is a common disease, were the epidemic’s culprits (Kushner, 2020). Including the residents themselves pointed to this reason: according to residents, the source of the infection was the Nepalese base, the waste from which was discharged without purification into the nearby river. (Kushner, 2020). The first final report stated that there were no culprits. However, under pressure from the public, the studies continued, and soon scientists received irrefutable evidence that the residents’ suggestions were indeed correct.
Conclusion
Thus, the emergence, development, and victory over the disease are not the same for different countries. To a large extent, the degree and methods of the spread of the disease, as well as the mechanisms of combating it, are influenced by the position of the region in the system of global social and political relations, as well as the cultural and economic landscape of the country (Mika, 2020). Climatic features are also an essential factor, however, to the extent that the population can cope with its consequences. Global inequality and political violence, structural and infrastructural deficiencies become the primary agents of the spread of epidemics and not the pathogen per se.
References
Agbedahin, K. (2019). The Haiti Cholera Outbreak and Peacekeeping Paradoxes. Peace Review, 31(2), 190-198.
Kushner, J. (2020). ‘It became part of life’: How Haiti curbed cholera. The Guardian. Web.
Mattingly, C., & Throop, J. (2018). The anthropology of ethics and morality. Annual Review of Anthropology, 47, 475-492.
Mika, K. (2020). Documenting hurt: UN, epistemic injustice, and the political ecology of the 2010 cholera epidemic in Haiti. Modern & Contemporary France, 1-18.