Comments on: Insanity

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 08 May 2008 18:02:22 +0000

They are apparently picking and choosing among donors, so there is no clear pattern, other than anyone who is in any way associated with the democratic movement is being excluded. Were I a cynic I would believe that remarks bad mouthing the regime while offering assistance was designed to have it both ways – offer aid you don’t intend to send while insuring the junta will reject it.

By: Steve Bates

Steve Bates — Thu, 08 May 2008 05:48:31 +0000

An event that caused tens of thousands of deaths is horrifying in and of itself. The possibility of a rice shortage in the region is even more so. Thanks for the link, Bryan; as unsettling as this is (especially to a vegetarian!), I’d rather know than not know. FTR, Texas grows a lot of rice; I doubt I’ll miss a meal… but the notion of a famine due to rice shortage probably troubles me more than most people.

I suppose individuals will have to wait (one hopes not very long) to figure out the best way to help, if indeed Burma’s military government allows real help. If they are rejecting offers from NGOs, my usual approach of contributing to Doctors Without Borders won’t cut it this time. Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 08 May 2008 02:36:03 +0000

You can include Sri Lanka and Bangladesh in the famine worries as they import a large portion of their rice from Burma, and one crop is gone. The next crop may not even grow with the fields under salt water. It will take major amounts of rain to flush out the fields.

We lose trees down here two and three years after hurricanes from wind-borne salt water soaking the soil, and they have actual sea water that came in with the surge trapped in the rice paddies. Their ground water will also be affected.

The junta is holed up in their new capital which wasn’t affected, planning some way of stealing even more from people who now have even less.

By: Kryten42

Kryten42 — Thu, 08 May 2008 01:40:23 +0000

Rudd is not at all pleased with the paranoid moronic military dictators in Burma. He’s was quite annoyed in a press conference yesterday. Figures we had were 22k dead, 40k known missing (which he said in Burma usually means dead), many others wounded. The fear here is (according to a friend in Canberra) that the dictators will use this as an excuse for a *purge*. Also, since they lost much of their crops, famine is a worry as well as disease.

What a world.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 08 May 2008 01:08:58 +0000

Based on the population density maps I’ve seen and the satellite photos showing a massive amount of the southern tip of the county still under water on the 5th, I think it is possible that the 100,000 estimate that includes disease may be low. No one has even been to two provinces that are peopled by non-Burmese.

Add to this the salt water intrusion from the storm surge over the heart of the rice region and the long term outlook is even worse.

By: Fallenmonk

Fallenmonk — Thu, 08 May 2008 00:57:28 +0000

I’ve been reading around a bit and 100,000 is the highest estimate I have seen but let’s all hope it is not that bad. My fear is that the delay in getting aid to the people will allow dysentery, typhoid and all the rest of the dirty water problems to come into play. That scenario could easily double or triple any numbers of direct dead.