Time to Clean Up!

I spent some time outside of the clinic today, helping out with a clean-up. Now ordinarily, this type of maintenance or gardening as some might call it, does not fall under what I would ordinarily categorize as health-related work. However, upon understanding the organizational structure of the Rural Health Unit, I quickly realized that this does in fact have a place. The Rural Health Unit is staffed by a Sanitation Worker, Mercy, who is a trained nurse. As there was a recent outbreak of dengue in the area, she ordered a mandatory clean up in the affected neighborhoods as a way to search and destroy any breeding spots for mosquitos. The clean up involved tearing down some of the long over grown grass and shoveling out the debris that had accumulated in the water tunnels. It was interesting to me to see this type of work because those who were helping out were members of the community. They were not “hired hands” per se but rather individuals from various groups and organizations that had come together to help clean up their own community. They were taking responsibility for their own environment and working together. 

However, I wish that their actions were more proactive, rather than reactive. Nicaragua has a similar problem with dengue and malaria outbreaks. In Nicaragua they have solved this problem by going house to house and explaining the importance of keeping standing water covered, making sure that no small pockets of water accumulate in trash, and teaching the individuals how to identify and destroy potential breeding spots. They also would put a sand like mixture in any large tanks of standing water that would prevent mosquitos from laying eggs and growing. In this way, it is actually quite interesting to see how different countries treat and deal with the same issue. Granted, in the Philippines, dengue cases have not be seen for a very long time. My worry though is that once it comes, it will spread quite rapidly and grow out of control.