Below is a list of stories I enjoyed but did not have time to write about. Happy holidays everyone.
I was once asked what I would use a single airship in a massive natural disaster response scenario. The question was actually more specific, it was how I would use a single airship responding from Bahrain to Karachi, Pakistan in a humanitarian support operation following a massive natural disaster with an airship that could move at 100 mph to prepare the way for naval forces responding from the sea.
Winning the War, 30 Taliban at a Time
But the much more important point remains: how could we possibly have any idea how the war is going, here or anywhere else, when the bad guys seem only to die in groups of 30? The sheer ubiquity of that number in fatality and casualty counts is astounding, to the point where I don’t even pay attention to a story anymore when they use that magic number 30. It is an indicator either of ignorance or deliberate spin… but no matter the case, whenever you see the number 30 used in reference to the Taliban, you should probably close the tab and move onto something else, because you just won’t get a good sense of what happened there.
H1N1: Musings on Conflict and Disease Transmission
Malnutrition has always been a major risk factor for disease transmission, allowing diseases that would normally be considered of minor public health importance to take a foothold in a population and become major issues. Lack of food security also contributes to the consumption of poorer quality food, increasing the potential for outbreaks of foodborne illness in an already compromised group.
International Medical Corps: A Thousand Words
For 25 years, International Medical Corps has been training doctors and providing medical care in some of the world’s most troubled places. From Angola and Bosnia, to Afghanistan and Somalia, International Medical Corps staff have been working with locals to mitigate the effects of things like war, natural disaster, and malnutrition. Along the way, the group has collected photos from the field. Now, those photos have been published in a new book called A Thousand Words. International Medical Corps President and CEO Nancy Aossey recently sat down with The World to talk about some of her favorite photos from the book.
Christopher Albon is a Ph.D. candidate specializing in armed conflict, public health, human security, and health diplomacy.
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