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Tsunami and meningo

tsunami n., A very large ocean wave caused by an underwater earthquake or volcanic eruption. [Japanese: tsu, port + nami, wave.]
meningococcus n. A bacterium (Neisseria meningitides) that causes cerebrospinal meningitis and meningococcemia.

Two words, unfamiliar to most people, that lent a pall of gloom to the smoky haze of fireworks as Filipinos greeted the lackluster New Year. Some religious seers would even read a sense of Apocalypse into the latest series of tragic yearend events.

We refer to two terrible agents of disasters that tore into the public consciousness as 2004 drew to a close. One, the killer wave, is very immense, and the other, the killer bacteria, is very tiny. One occurs quite rarely but kills on a massive scale, the other does its damage daily but kills rather few.

Last Dec. 26, a tsunami killed more than 150,000 and displaced millions of Asian coastal communities within a few hours. The staggering cost in human lives and livelihoods across Asia cannot be comprehended by mere statistical figures and media reportage alone.

On the other hand, meningococcemia routinely downs at least 50,000 worldwide every year, with an estimated case-fatality rate ranging from 10% to 20% in the US and other developed countries, or higher among Third World countries. In recent weeks, a cluster of cases in Baguio and Benguet unnerved the public and the local tourism industry.

Geo-science cannot as yet predict – never mind prevent – earthquakes that generate tsunamis. But we have at least the technology to rapidly analyze the onset of a major earthquake, instantaneously calculate the potentials for tsunami, and promptly disseminate early warnings to all threatened areas. The question that comes to mind is thus: Why has the technology not been extensively deployed, and had to wait for the end-December killer tsunami for proposals to be tabled at the so-called Tsunami Summit?

Meanwhile, medical science has succeeded in developing technologies, including vaccines and prophylactics, that can quickly detect and control if not yet eradicate meningococcal outbreaks. We now learn, in the wake of the current spate of meningo cases in Baguio and elsewhere, that a preventive vaccine against meningococcus is available. But it is so expensive, that public health authorities and other government agencies balk at the prospect of spending millions of pesos to inoculate the entire population of Baguio-Benguet, or billions of pesos to make the vaccination nationwide.

Admittedly, it remains debatable among public health professionals whether massive anti-meningo inoculation is an urgent need. Others insist that more funding should be deployed against TB and typhoid as bigger threats. But the point is that medical science – if properly employed – has enough capability to minimize if not totally wipe out these major public health hazards. Why hasn’t it been deployed earlier here in the country?

The answers, of course, lie not so much in the fields (and admitted failings and limitations) of science and technology, but of current economics and politics.

The combination of imperialist globalization and Third World stagnation has resulted in states and economies that allocate more funding to Star Wars defense systems and Hollywood computer magic than anti-tsunami warning networks, more funding to showcase infrastructure projects and barrio counter-insurgency intelligence systems than community health care.

Various people’s movements and social advocates have repeatedly expressed serious concern about a wide range of environmental and health problems that kill people and destroy communities, especially those that could have been prevented or minimized had governments and corporations paid more attention to providing much needed social services rather than simply earning more revenue and keeping themselves in power.

We in media have a big role to play in this regard.

The information that we disseminate should not merely amplify the tragic pictures of disasters or over-prettify the belated and pathetic (if heroic) efforts of various agencies to cope with the problems that they could have anticipated or even prevented in the first place. Instead, we must accurately and fully disseminate all the information and advisories needed for the public to make the decisions themselves according to their best interests.

Indeed, we must put the sharpest focus of our cameras, reportage and analytical tools on the various socio-economic and political factors that have long prevented our nation from preventing, controlling, and quickly recovering from environmental and health disasters. Thus, we help mobilize the public to continually push for urgent economic and political reforms that will enable the country to survive not just natural calamities but the worsening social crisis.

And so, as we brace ourselves for the events yet to come in year 2005, globally and locally, let us remember the lesson of the tsunami and meningo. Science and media should continually prod governments, the corporate world, and society as a whole: “Reform now, or be ruined!”

We think that this is a more realistic yet upbeat New Year message than those of assorted soothsayers whose bottom-line prophecies are either “Repent, for the end of the world is at hand,” or “This year will be a better year.” #

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