By Otto Rodriguez
MiamiDadeHealth.com
For centuries, humanity has been battling diseases, and the latest Ebola outbreak in Africa in 2014 is a reminder that as our cities get bigger and international travel is increasingly accessible, the risks of an epidemic in large communities, such as Miami-Dade County, is as scary as it has ever been.
The Black Death that swept Europe in the XIV century, for example, killed as much as half the population in that continent and close to 200 million worldwide
In 1918, the Spanish flu was fueled by the movement of soldiers bound for or returning from Europe’s battlegrounds. During that epidemic between 50 and 100 million people died, many more than the fatalities of the First World War itself, and maybe more than have died in any conflict.
One of the aggravating factors to the 2014 Ebola crisis was the lack of a governance mechanism that would allow an effective link between what was being observed at the country and city levels and the alert mechanisms necessary to trigger an emergency response.
In South Florida, though those governance mechanisms exist in the form of local governments and other agencies in charge of public health, the challenges to cope with a wide-spread pandemic remain. Epidemics related to West Nile, SARS, H1N1, and the Zika viruses attest to that.
Urban centers can be catalysts for a rapid spread of infectious diseases. Large population groups in a restricted area, such as what exists in South Florida, can provide the perfect conditions for different epidemics. International travel has connected the world in the last century, and this mobility creates a potential threat of many emerging diseases.
According to the World Economic Forum, the vulnerability of urban centers to pandemics points to the need for strong public-private coordination involving organizations beyond the traditional healthcare sector. Industries as diverse as food production, telecommunications, and corporate supply chains will determine how epidemics are fought in the future.
Miami-Dade Health will publish in the future a series of articles on how to cope with a pandemic in a community like ours and whether the agencies in charge of public health in South Florida are truly prepared to face that challenge.
