Inevitable

Back in the day when I was in PGH-land, we would count seven days from heavy flooding and watch, like clockwork, as the leptospirosis folk would be brought into the emergency room. They come in very sick -- highly febrile, with aching bodies especially around the abdominal area. The story is the same: lumusob sa baha (I walked in the flood).

Very few survive untreated leptospirosis, it is a bacterial infection that attacks the body focusing on the kidneys. Muscle aches and pains, generalized sepsis, and kidney failure. Death in a matter of weeks.

The bacteria that lives in rat urine finds its way through the flood water into open human sores. And you know how many Filipinos do not wear shoes? All the more risk at contracting it. Truly disgusting. You can take a pill immediately after wading in the nasty stuff as preventive medication. Ask your doctor.

Hospital cases on the rise, from an average of 1 case a month in PGH, they are up to 20 as of yesterday. The cases in San Lazaro, in RITM, in other hospitals are up too.

Looking at footage from the evacuation centers, it hit me that the people who will survive all this disease may mutate. Like in the cartoons when the toxic sludge falls on a town and everybody zombifies? That's not too far fetched. Some of them are already acting like animals- destroying blackboards, stealing furniture and books, smearing classrooms with excrement. The mutation may not be physical but the Lord of the Flies scenario is already starting.