I'm just doing a little catching up with this old news story. It goes back to right after the big earthquake and tsunami occurred. In addition to the obvious injury and loss of life, there were many other health problems that accompanied the survivors in the following days and weeks.
The first was a large outbreak of colds and flu among the people living in the refugee shelters. Most of these locations were school gymnasiums or other auditoriums where there were many people living very close together without proper medical supplies or sanitation. To make the matters worse, most of the damaged area was still in the winter season. In addition to the physical difficulties, the close quarters and lack of privacy caused a certain amount of mental stress as well.
When the evacuees had to go to the shelters, it was of course on short notice and people were not able to take their medications with them. This lead to a number of deaths especially in old people from hypertension and diabetes complications. After the quake, there was a breakdown of transportation between medical supply distributors and the hospitals if they still existed. And from there, the doctors had a hard time finding where their patients were.
Many of the people who's homes were still standing had no water, electricity, natural gas or garbage collection. Many people were using gas powered electric generators and unwittingly had the machines running in the houses which caused some carbon monoxide complications.
After the water had receded, a muddy sludge was left covering the ground. As this sludge dried, it turned into a fine black dust which caused respiratory problems for the people living and working there.
In the following months after the earthquake, refugees were relocated outside of their original communities. There were a few sad incidents of elderly people passing away because they had no family or known neighbors nearby to check on their daily safety.
Note: Since this last news story originally came out, a system of signal devices were created for elderly people to call for help in an emergency.
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