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India is drowning in its own excreta

blogs.scientificamerican.com

131–137 of 137 posts

Re: India is drowning in its own excreta

#131

no mention of india spending $1 trillion on infrastructure over 2013 - 2018.

Even if true, 20%-30% of that is probably taken as a winners fee by the politicians. So the contractors have to buy substandard materials and labor, causing this "infrastructure" to last a decade or two, at best.

India is electing a new government in 2014. Giving the $1 trillion expenditure a better chance of curbing said problem.

Most of the contractors will be foreign. e.g. The North-South Rail Corridor being built by Japan's International Cooperation Agency

Re: India is drowning in its own excreta

#132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> India is one country I'm not setting foot in for the foreseeable future. Yes its a shame. You don't have to live there. But 1 of every 6 fellow humans do. And not all of them openly defecate. Some are even pleasant enough to shake hands with. Many take a lot more antibiotics to ward off the germs but still die early. Lucky for you you don't have to die early :) but armed with antibiotics and Fiona's travel guides (…

Which in a round-about way - means that sanitation problems in India might turn into problems for the rest of humanity through the over/misuse of antibiotics leading to widespread resistance.

Indeed, that coupled with poor regulation of prescription drugs and lack of awareness of dangers of antibiotic misuse.

I was researching global antiobiotic misuse and came upon an interactive map of antiobiotic resistance for major diseases http://www.cgdev.org/page/looking-drug-resistance Be sure to click on the individual diseases as the default there is Multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis

A more detailed report http://www.cgdev.org/sites/default/files/1424207_file_CGD_DR...

Re: India is drowning in its own excreta

#133
post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Others of us have decided not to live in San Francisco (or India). I'm not being entirely flippant; I'm originally from the Bay Area, and the filth is a significant part of the reason I live in Tokyo now. Regularly encountering human feces is one of several things I don't miss.

I'm also from the Bay Area and have lived in SF proper for about 15 years. I don't think I've ever encountered human feces. Were you a sewage worker?

I wish I was a SF sewage worker I'd be retired with a nice pension by now ;)

Aloisius you just needed to walk around more in the downtown area - I walk everywhere. Next time you are here take a look around the NW corner of Mission and 8th in the nooks and crannies of the PG&E building. I'm betting you will find something if it has not just rained.

This stuff is just not well documented but this guy has a blog about his street in SOMA (somewhere just of 6th near Mission) that captures some of the flavor of the place:

http://www.olddirtyalley.net/

Why is this stuff just invisible to so many people here?

Re: India is drowning in its own excreta

#134
post #127
post #73

Open defecation is also practiced in San Francisco. I have seen is occurring in front of my apartments and on the street. You can find human feces on almost any walk through SOMA, the Tenderloin or Civic Center area if you know what to look for (expert tip: dogs don't look for hiding places to poo). We have decided this is not a problem.

Indeed. For example, our Muni and Bart escalators are toilets at night for homeless people, to the point where they literally seize up from so much human waste. And our government acts like this is normal and there's nothing to be done.

Everyone just ignores this for some reason.

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Human-waste-shuts-down...

Re: India is drowning in its own excreta

#135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the reason that people don't care enough is because they have so much on their plate. This is the 'false cause' fallacy[1]. It is akin to saying, because I have too much work stacked up, instead of making progress, I'd rather cool my heels and not do anything at all, ever. [1] https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/false-cause

No, it's not. It is akin to saying thay I have too much work stacked up, so instead of making progress on issue X, I'd rather invest my limited resources on issues other than X. That is not a logical fallacy, that's basic decisionmaking.

> That is not a logical fallacy, that's basic decisionmaking.

No. The parent had this to say---"Instead, the average Indian believes he lives in a super developed city, wears his / her goggles, pulls up the car window, turns on the AC and listens to Bollywood or American music. Simple, problem solved (at least for the day)."

Clearly, there is no decision making issue here. The issue is that there are several problems (the plate being full) but the onlooker (the more privileged in the quote) is not doing anything---it's not as if he/she chooses to tackle a part of the problem e.g., sanitation, he/she does nothing. That's why I said the reasoning amounts to false cause---it's not because the plate is full that people are not doing anything. More likely cause is that they simply don't care.

Re: India is drowning in its own excreta

#136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

imho the overpopulation needs to be adressed the chinese way. I don't think that throwing tech at it will solve the problem. I remember vaguely, that one indian gov. wanted to sterilize slum inhabitants and wasn't reelected.

Are you writing that they should have been pro-sterilisation? They could just round up and shoot all the slum inhabitants so they wouldn't need to wait an entire generation to be rid of them.

china has a one-child-only policy since 79. I thought that this is known http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-child_policy

Re: India is drowning in its own excreta

#137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

imho the overpopulation needs to be adressed the chinese way. I don't think that throwing tech at it will solve the problem. I remember vaguely, that one indian gov. wanted to sterilize slum inhabitants and wasn't reelected.

The population is not a problem, the population is a resource. Of course, to be (more) valuable (than it is now) it has to receive some attention/investment. The sterilization of people that possess the potential of growing and becoming beneficial to society is, for the society as a whole, a form of self-mutilation.

I agree to certain degree, but the indian pop.growth is just not sustainable. Closing the eyes doesn't make it go away: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:India-demography.png
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