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India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

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Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#231

Post by metellus »

anigbrowl wrote: post #227
trprog wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it would be simpler and easier but who is going to pay for it? Cambodia is a nation of around 15 million people and a large proportion of them are affected by iron deficiency. You are talking about trying to get skillets/ingots into the hands of hundreds of thousands of people, if not millions. Even cutting the cost of each item by $1 reduces the overall cost to either the organization(s) running the progra…

The economic upsides from improved public health outcomes make it seem like a textbook case for foreign aid - it's easy enough to quantify the cost of the iron deficiency. Admittedly I'm thinking in autocratic terms rather than about the need for buy-in and all the other factors.

Sure, but the iron fish option is cheaper and just as effective. With the money they're saving but using ingots instead of whole skillets, they can solve other problems too.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#232

Post by thevardanian »

gumby wrote: post #124
sidlls wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People understand just fine what "illness" is. Every culture has a long tradition of medical practice since long before anyone knew what a germ was, and people in many civilizations (this isn't some eurocentric western-world thing) have known for hundreds or thousands of years to keep feces away from their food and water. It seems obvious because it is obvious and has been, in India and practically everywhere else, f…

>> In many places there is no connection between 'germs' and illness because germs are not a concrete concept to them. > People understand just fine what "illness" is. Every culture has a long tradition of medical practice since long before anyone knew what a germ was, and people in many civilizations (this isn't some eurocentric western-world thing) have known for hundreds or thousands of years to keep feces away fr…

You have Indians invent small-pox vaccination techniques which clearly shows, at least to some level, an understanding and acceptance of the idea of "germs" albeit something more basic.

Furthermore trying to tie everything to caste related issues will cause more harm than good, as it is popular and easy to blame a simple demon the truth is often more nuanced.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#233

Post by Pica_soO »

vacri wrote: post #204
toomanybeersies wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If someone's shooting at you, you're going to make damn sure you take every measure possible to not get shot. There are no atheists in foxholes.

However being in a foxhole is an entirely artificial situation, and people in foxholes aren't known for their long-range planning and forethought. If you're being shelled, you're not going to be thinking about whether you can service a new mortgage and whether you should refinance, for example.

I wonder, if you put a mathematician specializing in statistics into a foxhole, what are the odds he becomes a believer?

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#234

Post by GeneralMayhem »

droopyEyelids wrote: post #134
adamkittelson wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or we could explore the possibility that the acceptable amount of human feces on the streets of a major city in a first world country is none.

You can't reliably tell the difference between human and other omnivore feces, and there are always going to be coyotes pooping wherever they please. Gotta accept a bit of poop in your life.

There's not a lot of coyotes in downtown SF...

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#235

Post by a_imho »

babyrainbow wrote: post #211
avar wrote: post #16

> Unfortunately, in many places, it’s not > feasible to lay down sewer pipes or build > treatment facilities. [...] But giving > people access to toilets isn’t enough. You > also have to persuade them to use the > toilets. I can't find it now, but there was a news video making the rounds a year or two ago that showed that this problem is much more fundamental than that. It showed a Indians in a tiny village who were…

Ok. "Educated" people don't shit where they drink from. But they do much worse. Things like dumping toxic industrial waste that can make a whole region of people chronically ill to a river..Or drive machines that spew toxic gases literally to the face of fellow human beings.. I mean, is anyone really any better?

Out of sight, out of mind.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#236

Post by theprop »

This is probably the single best way to reduce rape in India as well. I remember in one Indian tv serial episode, the plot was a woman who refused to marry a man (in a village) until he got indoor plumbing in the house so she didn't have to go to a field at night to use the bathroom.

India was one of the first countries in the world to emphasize regular bathing -- this was thousands of years ago, even the kings among the Europeans started bathing daily fewer than 300 years ago. We need to get hygiene country-wide to the world standards it created.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#237

Post by tomaskafka »

avar wrote: post #16

> Unfortunately, in many places, it’s not > feasible to lay down sewer pipes or build > treatment facilities. [...] But giving > people access to toilets isn’t enough. You > also have to persuade them to use the > toilets. I can't find it now, but there was a news video making the rounds a year or two ago that showed that this problem is much more fundamental than that. It showed a Indians in a tiny village who were…

Check out how we, the 'wise modern civilization' splash all our chemicals and shit into the rivers and oceans, and then eat fish from there.

I bet we will be looked at as 'these savage guys were totally dumb, look at them, it's unbelievable' about 50 - 150 years later.

Also, you americans take away your babies from your mothers after few weeks, putting them to a cold hearted institutions, making them frustrated for life? In exchange for what, extra 1 % of GDP from working mothers? That's a pretty bad deal I must say.

Most people in Europe would see this as a barbaric practice, as we know children need a close contact with parents till at least 2.5 years (don't you study developmental psychology there?), and our social systems support that.

(wanted to show that we both are 'those dumb indians' from some more civilized point of view)

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#238

Post by dang »

Asooka wrote: post #142

That's Roma for you. I've seen educated Roma people, but they also have examples of some of the most parasitic and unhygienic behaviour. IIRC, various cultures have tried to integrate them and get them to behave in a more civilized manner over the last 1000 years give or take, with precisely zero success.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14207350 and marked it off-topic.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#239

Post by dang »

Pica_soO wrote: post #113

The thing that strikes me as the most odd - is that until ww1 (thats right the recent Battlefieldified one)- soldiers would carry talismans into the battle, that where supposed to make them bulletproof and immortal. Thats right, something that sounds oh, so exotic, right in the midst of the west. Also, it helps if you look at the Congo and Europe during WW2. The same chaos, the same refugee rows, the same anarchy and…

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14205839 and marked it off-topic.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#240

Post by dang »

redsummer wrote: post #126

Hinduism is a big problem. The Ganges is literally a river of shit - it has 120 times the safe level of fecal matter. Yet Hindus regard it as purifying and it's considered holy to have a dip in it. When you have a culture like that, it's going to be hard to persuade people to not shit in the water they drink.

You've been violating the HN guidelines so frequently and posting so uncivilly (e.g. religious and racial flamewars) that we've banned this account. If you don't want it to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that this won't happen in the future.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14205447 and marked it off-topic.

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