Via BMJ Group Blogs: Suchita Shah: Everywhere, but not a drop to drink: water shortage in Santiago, Chile. Excerpt:
I turn on the kitchen tap but no water flows. Surprised, and a little confused, I go to the bathroom—nothing. The shower—dry. Then I recall the notice seen earlier in the hotel lift. Something in Spanish about a water shortage. Some vague emails circulated this morning about Santiago’s water supplies being cut off for the day. Must be that, I think to myself. Oh well, only a few hours. Can’t be that bad. At least I have electricity.
A few minutes later, I want to wash my hands. It is nearly 30 degrees and I have been out and about all morning. I also want to take a shower, maybe fill the kettle, brush my teeth, flush the loo, rinse vegetables to cook for lunch. But all those things require a precious commodity that, for the next 10 hours, I will not possess. I decide to venture out to equip myself with bottled water.
Remarkably, the fountain outside my hotel is in full flow. A homeless man washes himself in it with abandon, relinquishing his few belongings to the street, whilst I clutch my handbag fiercely, warnings of pickpockets ringing in my head. I feel slightly ashamed. It dawns on me that, today, we are all the “great unwashed.” Rich, poor, cuicos, hobos, gringos, all equal in our filth, sweat, and humanness. I may attempt to deny or buy my way out of it, with perfume and bottled water, but the evidence speaks against me.
The street dogs of Santiago are smart, I think. They’ve sniffed out the territory and know where the supplies are at. It’s only people like us who go to the supermarket and feel surprised when the shelves are empty. People who have lived in relative comfort all their lives.
I thought this when I watched a scene from the film “Machuca,” showing people queuing for food at hyperinflated prices under Salvador Allende’s presidency in the early 70s. I also thought this as I stood in the Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos (Museum of Memory and Human Rights) the other day, a museum commemorating those who were imprisoned, tortured, and eliminated during the Pinochet dictatorship. As my (very wise) grandmother said to me before I left for one of my travels, encountering difficulty can make you resilient.
Many shops and businesses were closed today (Wednesday 23 January 2013) and a third of the city’s population, around 600,000 families, in 21 districts, are without water.
According to the BBC, the supply has been cut off because the Maipo (the main river that flows through the Santiago metropolitan region) was contaminated through landslides from the Andes. It seemed we were given little warning. Yet, people were still out on the streets in my district this afternoon, going about their usual business, chatting, smoking, eating ice cream, or drinking a pisco sour. They seemed unfazed. Resilient.
I was supposed to write about family medicine in Chile. I have come here to learn about health reform and community medicine. Instead, today’s events compel me to write about the most basic of public health needs, and a human right—access to clean water.
