I suppose it was to be expected. When you spend time around sick people, you will get sick. So, yes, I spent most of this week suffering through a nasty upper respiratory infection. A typical virus that came in with a sore throat and left with a stuffy nose. Although, if you ask anyone around here, it could have been malaria...
I survived my cold without any trouble, but got a great insight into how deeply held the common, "catch-all" diagnosis of malaria really is. It makes sense, I guess, if you live in a village where most women aim to have at least 5 kids, as they know that there is a good chance they may lose 1 or 2 to malaria before the age of 5. Although tragic that these women are probably correct with their diagnosis, the subsequent common labeling of every febrile illness as malaria goes undisputed in day-to-day life. The examples are endless. In an article today by the BBC about the violence in Northern Uganda, there were only 2 reported reasons that people died. They were either victims of the LRA, or... "malaria". Another example came from some of the residents in the hospital. These doctors can list every malarial symptom, stage in the parasite's lifecycle and side-effect of the treatments, but still admit to putting themselves on empiric anti-malaria medication at the first sign of just about any illness. Who can blame them, I suppose. The stakes are high, and the treatment is cheap.
In any case, I survived my cold and am feeling much better. But maybe I'll stock our bathroom with some new medication. Just in case.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
glad you are better! sounds like they need you healthy over there. it's always fascinating to see if the health care professionals end up generally more or less sick than the every man due to the greater exposure.
but i definitely think that's ENOUGH malaria for now, thank you. some of us are worriers!!
Post a Comment