Photographer : sqrantarch @ flickr
When new viruses emerge, the media tends to focus on the medical side of the issue—where the virus has come from, what the symptoms are, and how we can treat it. However, viruses are not just a medical problem. Inequalities at the global and local levels also affect the emergence and spread of viruses, as do the ways in which we interact with our environment. The world is interconnected, and issues that we brush aside as 'not our problem' will come back to haunt us. Australia may be an island, but that hasn't stopped Australians from catching H1N1, and it won't stop us from being affected by problems such as climate change or wars in other parts of the world.
To understand the politics of flu, we need to begin by understanding that disease hits the poor the hardest. According to Mexican Child Link, 40 per cent of the Mexican population share only 11 per cent of the wealth, and are considered to be living below the poverty line (the minimum income seen as necessary for a decent standard of living). Many of these people live in overcrowded conditions, with limited access to things that we take for granted, including electricity and clean water.
Diseases are often spread through dirty or contaminated water, and are spread more easily when people live in cramped conditions without access to proper sanitation. Additionally, those who are very poor are often not healthy enough to withstand diseases. If you don't have access to good food, including fresh fruit and vegetables, you are far more likely to get sick.
The ability to access healthcare is also important. In Australia, we are lucky to have a reasonably good healthcare system, in which access to medical care (mostly) doesn't rely on having money. Mexico has some public healthcare, but the standard varies. This is partly a result of 'structural adjustment' policies pushed onto Mexico during the 1980s, which required Mexico to cut spending on health and education in return for loans from the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, and US government. These policies also required Mexico to cut protection for minimum wages. This means that more people are struggling on low wages, and that more people can't afford to see a good doctor, making it harder to track and control the spread of disease.
Finally, diseases often emerge where humans and wild animals interact. The movement of people into areas that were once wild can happen for a number of reasons. Sometimes, it happens because people are forced to enter new areas in order to find food, as has happened with poaching in national parks in the Congo. At other times, it might be caused by suburban sprawl as we clear new land to build housing estates. Diseases seem to be more likely to occur where animal populations are threatened—the Hendra virus that killed a Brisbane horse trainer and 14 horses in 1994 was spread by bats that were displaced from their usual habitat.
When we fail to look after our environment, ignore the plight of those living in terrible conditions, or support government policies that force poorer nations to ignore the needs of their people, we are creating problems for ourselves as well as others. We should have learnt by now that we can't escape the consequences of our actions. Australia may be an island, but we are not isolated. We have very high levels of emigration (people moving away) and immigration (people moving here). It is also estimated that around 5.8 million tourists will come to Australia in 2009, while around 6.8 million Australians will go overseas. We can't quarantine ourselves, as we've seen from the Australians who caught H1N1 while travelling.
This means that there are both practical and ethical reasons for helping to solve problems in other parts of the world. Ethically, we have a responsibility to help others who are suffering, whether they are next door or half a world away. Practically, we should help to solve these issues because they are likely to affect us if we don't. For example, asylum seekers arrive in Australia because of the instability, which we helped to create, in the Middle East. We worry about droughts and floods and the hole in the ozone layer, because we (and others) have polluted too much. Similarly, the ease with which diseases spread means that overcrowding in Mexico (or South Africa, or China) is our problem too. No clean water for a child in a slum in Nairobi is our problem.
Stopping the spread of disease will involve much more than washing our hands with soap and wearing a face mask. We need to work together and put pressure on our government to take a responsible approach to global inequality. There isn't an easy way to do this, but there are a few steps that we can take that will make a difference. The first is to be informed about the policies our government is pursuing internationally, including the agenda it's pushing in terms of climate change, trade, and international rules for working conditions. The second step is to look for ways to put pressure on the government if it's doing the wrong thing, such as writing to ministers or taking part in protests. Finally, we can also think about how our lives affect other people throughout the world. It's hard to take responsibility for problems happening on another continent, but maybe it's time that we start.
How do I know this?
'30 Australians being tested for swine flu', ABC News,
www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/05/17/2572774.htm 17 May 2009, viewed 17 May 2009.
Australian Government Productivity Commission, 'Rates of disease associated with poor environmental health',
www.pc.gov.au/?a=68653 17 February 2009, viewed 18 May 2009.
'Hendra and the bats', Background Briefing, ABC Radio National,
www.abc.net.au/rn/backgroundbriefing/stories/
2009/2444985.htm 25 January 2009, viewed 26 January 2009.
Heredia, C and M Purcell, 'Structural adjustment in Mexico', Development Group for Alternative Policies,
www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/46/013.html 1995, viewed 18 May 2009.
Hugo, G, 'Globalisation and changes in Australian international migration', Journal of Population Research, Vol. 23, No. 2, 2006,
www.jpr.org.au/upload/JPR23-2Hugo.pdf viewed 5 May 2009.
Mexico Child Link, 'Mexico – factfile and statistics', 2008,
www.mexico-child-link.org/mexico-factfile-statistics.htm viewed 18 May 2009.
Singer, P, One world: the ethics of globalisation, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2004.
Tourism Australia, 'Tourism Forecasts',
www.tourism.australia.com/Research.asp?sub=0408 December 2008, viewed 5 May 2009.
UNHCR, 'Australian asylum seeker numbers reflect worldwide trend',
www.unhcr.org.au/pdfs/090324asylumstatsaul.pdf 25 March 2009, viewed 6 May 2009.
Wald, P, 'Pandemic threats call for a focus on global poverty', The Herald-Sun,
www.hastac.org/node/2142 April 30 2009, viewed 4 May 2009.
