Nothing But Love :: golf blogger

The Real War Worth Fighting

There is something happening in Angola. You might be thinking that there's a war raging in Angola. You'd be wrong about that. The 27-year-long civil war ended in August, 2002.

But 159 people have died. CNN doesn't report it because this is happening in Africa to people of color, except for one, who was Italian, a physician, who was trying to stave off an epidemic of a disease which has no cure and which has killed almost all who have been infected. Twenty-two people have survived. Most who have perished have been children under the age of five.

The Marburg virus disease first presents with a fever, chills, headache, and general achiness, like any of a number of viral illnesses, serious and not so serious and usually progresses to a rash with nausea, vomiting, chest pain, sore throat, abdominal pain, and diarrhea by about the fifth day, then Signs and symptoms become increasingly severe and by the sixth day, can include jaundice, inflammation of the pancreas, severe weight loss, delirium, shock, and liver failure. By day seven or eight, massive hemorrhaging from the eyes, nose, mouth, and other openings occurs along with multi-organ dysfunction. Death invariably ensues.

Lassa Fever afflicts anywhere from 100,000 to 300,000 people in West Africa each year, including Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Nigeria, of which about 5,000 die from the viral infection, which is spread by rats.

And then there is AIDS, which is of epidemic proportions in Africa, affecting mostly women and children. In sub-Saharan Africa, three million people became infected with HIV in 2003 and 2,200,000 (think of every man, woman, and child in Denver and its surrounding environs or Tampa, Florida, disappearing) died of AIDS in that year.

In South Africa, the epidemic is generalized and reaches all segments of society. Heterosexual transmission is the predominant mode of infection. Fifty-seven percent of infected adults are women. Seventy five per cent of infected young people are women and girls.

Today, April 7, is World Health Day; and the theme is healthy mothers and children, emphasizing the need to change today's reality, in which half a million women die during pregnancy and childbirth each year and in which nearly 11 million children die before celebrating their fifth birthday.

This seems like a war worth fighting.

Posted by Bill at April 7, 2005 07:11 PM