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“We must act quickly, because what is coming is apocalyptic, because the country has suffered the serious damage that Eta left – last week – and now another storm of the same proportions is falling”, underlined Moncada from London. where it resides. .
Honduran scientists Salvador Moncada and Marco Tulio Medina warned this Saturday 14-N, in statements to Efe, that something “apocalyptic” is coming for their country, with the damage that will leave the tropical storm Iota, which is crossing the Caribbean .
“We have to act fast, because what’s coming is apocalyptic, because the country was left with the severe damage left by ‘Ages’ – last week – and now another storm of the same proportions is falling,” Moncada said. from London, where he lives.
This is why Moncada believes that “it is important to carry out an international mobilization” by the Honduran authorities and civil society, because up to now “there is practically nothing”.
“There are people who are raising money, but it is only on an individual level, in small organizations, but with what is coming, enormous help will be needed,” stressed the famous Honduran professional.
Rich countries need to help the poor
He added that through civil society organizations, the National Autonomous University of Honduras (Unah) and churches, among others, it is necessary to “publicize internationally” what Honduras awaits with the arrival of “Iota “, a phenomenon that next This week, its authorities warn, will cause serious damage to the country, whose soil is heavily saturated by the great floods caused by” Eta “.
“There will be damage that will require many millions of dollars to recover all of this and save people from a health situation that will become truly terrible,” said Salvador Moncada.
The scientist believes that it will take years for the country to recover from the new devastation it will suffer from the latest natural phenomena and that it will be “a health situation and damage to the civilian population that is very difficult to solve if there is no mass international aid” .
Effects of climate change
“This is a clear product of climate change, there must already be an increase in gastrointestinal and broncho-respiratory diseases in the country, an increase in the level of malnutrition, skin infections because these are polluted waters,” he added.
To look at it “strategically”, in the end, according to Moncada, “covid-19 could be the smallest problem of all”, because due to the total lack of protection of the population and the consequent diseases in the country “it could even end with the cholera epidemic or something terrible “with the arrival of Iota.
Moncada stressed that although the poorest countries, such as Honduras, “have not historically contributed to climate change, they are the ones that are suffering the most damage from these catastrophic events that are directly linked to climate change.”
In this sense, he expressed that “the rich countries, which have created climate change, should be ready to help our countries which have not contributed at all to this disastrous situation for humanity”.
Catastrophic public health situation
Marco Tulio Medina, for his part, has indicated that the new damage, with the most serious floods that Iota will leave, will also increase the cases of classic and severe dengue, another plague that afflicts Honduras, with over 24,000 patients so far in 2020.
He added that the floods will also cause other diseases such as leptospirosis, which is contracted from water contaminated by the urine of animals such as rats.
Furthermore, to continue to aggravate the health crisis that the Central American country is going through with the floods caused in less than three weeks by two tropical phenomena, infections and deaths from covid-19 are about to skyrocket.
“We are now talking about a catastrophic public health situation because not all protective measures are being taken,” said Medina, former dean of the Unah Faculty of Medical Sciences, who also works on other programs with the World Health Organization. WHO).
According to Medina, it was a mistake to authorize the free departure of all people in the midst of the covid-19 pandemic, after the floods caused by the tropical depression Eta.
He added that the pandemic is in an ascending phase in the country and that with the floods that “Eta” has left, with the isolation of many communities, “there is no way to adequately detect all the strategies that have been proposed at the international from WHO “.
“It is very difficult to have proper control, follow-up and trace covid-19 when there are lines of communication that are broken, which makes it difficult to transfer seriously ill people to hospitals for treatment,” he said.
This will become “practically very difficult, there will be an increase in mortality, hospitals will be isolated and overloaded with other diseases that will present themselves in an epidemic way, the prospects are really very dark and almost apocalyptic, as Dr. Moncada says.” Medina.
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