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The doctor says the parents of the patient were too poor to afford syringes; and the family was already starving in order to pay for the medicine. Wouldn’t it
by oefrha 7y ago
The doctor says the parents of the patient were too poor to afford syringes; and the family was already starving in order to pay for the medicine.
Wouldn’t it be nice if patients could afford anything. Reality doesn’t work that way though, and some first world people just can’t imagine what real poverty is like (I can’t either).
> When Mr. Jalbani protested, he said, Mr. Ghanghro snapped at him and told him he was using an old syringe because Mr. Jalbani was too poor to pay for a new one.
> “He said, ‘If you don’t want my treatment, go to another doctor.’” Mr. Jalbani said. “My wife and I had to starve ourselves to pay for the medicine.”
- hn_throwaway_99 7y agoI still for the life of me can't understand how anyone with any medical training at all could reuse a syringe. Some other shortcuts I could imagine, but reusing a syringe is like eventually guaranteeing this kind of outbreak.
- oefrha 7y agoBetween this and no treatment, the choice is easy for most people. Although I do find “rummaging through the trash” for syringes astonishing. If you’re gonna reuse it, at least sterilize it (failing that, rinse it) and store it somewhere clean?
- tomc1985 7y agoThis is what I've never understood about the "you don't know poverty" argument... sure they may not have equipment but there are basic best practices that cost little more than time Perhaps there are more people that would prefer to watch the world burn than we think
- oefrha 7y agoPoverty also correlates with lack of education, so there’s also that. I heard (without any verification) that until recently a large percentage of rural population in India find nothing wrong in drinking from and shitting in the same river (let’s put aside technicalities like upstream/downstream).
- hn_throwaway_99 7y agoSurely the doctors have some education, though.
- throwaway8941 7y agoBecause you don't know what real poverty is like (neither do I)? I remember a story from one of Atul Gawande's books (was it Complications?) about how rural Indian surgeons operate. As he described it, they were missing many kinds of equipment that western surgeons consider absolutely indispensable in doing their work. They replaced it with whatever was available, stuff like plastic piping from the nearest plumbing store, which then comes into contact with the entrails of the patient, so to speak.
- stubish 7y ago(assuming the anecdote is correct) Rummaging around in the rubbish for a syringe is not about poverty, except perhaps that in real poverty you only have access to the worst doctors or none at all. Even if economics make fresh needles impossible, it takes so little effort make an attempt to sterilize that this sort of behavior is criminal. Start by not storing needles you might want to reuse in the rubbish bin and donations of scraps of wood to boil water.
- hn_throwaway_99 7y agoThe point is if you are in real poverty, doing nothing is cheaper and healthier than reusing a syringe.
- zbentley 7y agoThat was in the book "Better". They found surgical tubing at a nearby market (not a plumbing store, presumably some sort of medical resale), and sterilized it with a steam autoclave before implanting it in a patient suffering from ... some form of meningitis, I believe?
- nitwit005 7y agoThey'll just end up even poorer if their kids get diseases through the syringes.
- adrianN 7y agoThe alternative is that the children don't get medical treatment and die.
- nitwit005 7y agoHave you ever gotten a non-emergency medical treatment so beneficial that it was worth getting HIV in exchange? Do you know anyone who has? I wish we had medicine that amazing, but it doesn't exist. In theory, such a treatment is possible, but in reality, they're just making everything worse.
- DoreenMichele 7y agoWouldn’t it be nice if patients could afford anything. What would be nice is if someone tried to find a viable solution for this issue, something that actually worked and was affordable.
- nexuist 7y agoThis is a possible solution for healthcare in the first world, but not the third world. "Affordability" makes no sense when these families (families, not individuals) are earning a few pennies a day. The only solution is to give stuff away for free at a loss. No amount of innovation or cost savings can fix the fact that people (and even institutions) cannot afford syringes. The only real issue in the third world is none other than lack of capital generating opportunities. Anyone who has capital can participate in the global economy and fix their own problems. Anyone who has a job can perform daily labor to earn capital that can fix their problems. The people who get lost - the people stuck in the third world - are offered no opportunities that would enable them to trade their labor for capital. If there were enough of these opportunities, all of these problems would go away.
- DoreenMichele 7y agoIn the third world, when IVs are not available to treat dehydration, they spoon feed people water. It takes up to two hours, but it's safe and effective. I did it once for one of my children. He was four and I didn't want him to be subjected to an IV. Possible solutions include an oral or topical medication to replace the injected medication. The poor in the US often also need actual affordable solutions that work. That seems to have improved some in recent years. It won't exist if no one even bothers to try.
- oefrha 7y agoWhile I agree with your general sentiment, you do realize that “the poor in the US” and the poor in Pakistan are orders of magnitude apart, don’t you?
- 7y ago