Virus

Talk about a morbid fascination.  All this talk of the Corona virus made me look at what kills people.  I went to the World Health Organization web site.  It made for some really interesting (to me) reading.

Nearly half of these were people over 70.  It seems to me something is gonna get ya.  My mum’s death certificate was fairly vague.  There were a number of items listed as the cause of death.

I became interested in this because I heard in Italy one person is dying from Corona virus every 10 minutes (it is now one every two minutes).  I can’t help think that one of the reasons we are so freaked out about this is because it affects us.  There are so many other things that kill people, but it seems because it is “over there” we do not give it a lot of thought.

Corona Virus has set the cat among the pigeons in Africa.  Many places do not have our health systems.  In the refugee camps, which are Corona virus free at the moment, the best they could do was provide one mask per person.  That’s it.  I reckon it would be hard to give washing my hands properly a high priority when food alone is hard to come by.

The number one killer world-wide is cardiovascular diseases at 31.8%.  According to my maths that is 17.81 million people (figures rounded).  The second biggest killer is cancers at 17.08% or 9.565 million people a year.  To me they are big numbers.  With those two alone we have just wiped out Australia’s population in a year.

It really surprised me to see that suicide killed 1.42 percent of people.  That is 795,200 people world-wide in a year.  Way more than I expected.

It was obvious to me what affects us.  So much time and money was being poured into it.  What was also unfortunately obvious was how little thought or expenditure was going into what are mostly third world problems.

I consider “Digestive Diseases” as mostly a third world problem.  Except for pizza going down the wrong way.  I do not make light of what is a very real problem for some, but percentage wise I think probably drinking dirty water contributes more to digestive problems.  I knew someone who visited a third world country.  Their whole visit they boiled the water.  Racing to the airport to come home they forgot and cleaned their teeth.  Ever since they have had a problem.  Those that die of “Digestive Diseases” is 2.38 million people a year.

Listed separately were “diarrheal diseases,” (I had gastro once.  Not pleasant.) “Malaria,” “Nutritional deficiencies,” “Protein-energy malnutrition,” and “Heat related (hot and cold exposure).”  Added to “Digestive Diseases” that is 5.13 million people or one every 6.15 seconds. Year in and out and the numbers of people grow.

I personally think it is right we limit the spread of Corona virus.  It does make me think though.  If only we put as much time, effort and money into eliminating what are largely preventable diseases.

Anyone who dies, and it matters not what gets them, is mostly someone’s loved one. If things were different that could be me.  I’m all for making life as good for as many as possible.  All I need is the will.  Therein lies the problem.