15 November
It is impossible to not notice the powerful natural disasters rattling many places in different parts of the world in these recent years. Just last month in September, a particularly strong earthquake destroyed numerous buildings in Albania and caused thirty to forty casualties.
The malaria situation in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh was ongoing into last August, affecting about sixty-thousand people in Sri Lanka while some sources report it has affected at least a hundred thousand, causing 70 deaths out of every 100 persons. It has also affected about 2,500 people in Bangladesh and the numbers continue to rise.
Unusually high temperatures during the dry season caused wildfires in the Amazon rainforest in October and have left about two million forest creatures dead or homeless.
And just a few days ago, a 4.1 magnitude earthquake about 30 miles to the north of Yangon is the talk of the town these days, hitting a bit too close for Yangonites’ comfort. And then there was the recent cyclone in Tokyo, Japan, that flooded large areas and left about 80 people either dead or missing.
The Australian government has announced a state of emergency concerning the bushfires that have been raging across its eastern lands and the strong hurricane in America and volcanic eruption in Indonesia are other examples of direct effects of natural disasters.
These are just prominent disasters that have made the news but there are many more out there occurring around the same time that are just as deadly, if not more.
Natural disasters will strike without warning no matter how prepared you are. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t implement effective countermeasures in place and leave everything to chance. And it doesn’t just stop there. The aftereffects and lingering consequences of natural disasters may persist for months or years.
Developed nations have emergency-response teams in place and their people are properly educated and aware of what to do when natural disasters strike. This has made effective mitigation of casualties for their people.
Likewise, Myanmar needs to be better prepared for natural disasters. There needs to be more awareness-raising campaigns and plans in place to respond immediately to natural disasters and also to take care of the consequences that follow.
GNLM
