vector
ISSUE 4, JULY 2007
Jacqui McDonnell “Mala is an 18-year-old Eritrean refugee. She was fleeing civil war in Eritrea by crossing the border into Sudan when the truck she was in hit an anti-vehicle mine. The 17 other people on the truck were killed and she suffered severe injuries including loosing both her legs and her right eye. Many vehicles containing refugees were destroyed in the same manner. Malaʼs future is bleak. She sits in a hut living on hand-outs with what is left of her family and is the subject of public scorn and ridicule”. Disability and poverty work together in a vicious cycle that escalates marginalisation and insecurity in developing communities. People with disabilities are among the poorest of disadvantaged communities, while people living in poverty are at a greater risk of attaining a disability. The United Nations estimates that 600 million people worldwide have a disability, seventy percent of which live in developing communities. Research by UNICEF has found that 150 million children living with disabilities lack access to essential services and have limited interactions with their peers. Often people with disabilities remain poor as they are denied the opportunities most basic and crucial to human development - education, income, and self worth.
poverty and disability
ing world can be greatly reduced.
Mae Tao Clinic School Health Program p 2 News review p 3 IHN update p 3 Links and resources p 4 Dr Sujit & the Calcutta Village Project p 4
Vector prizes for prose competition p 4
Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, by John Perkins Book Review by Dr Kathryn Loon “I basically get paid to shift huge amounts of money between international bank accounts to avoid paying tax,” said Steve, one of the residents, who was regaling us with tales of his job-on-the-side during an unusually quiet evening shift in the Emergency Department. Head swirling with fantasies of a life less ordinary as a high-flying merchant banker, itʼs no surprise that in the library some days later, my attention was immediately drawn to the title, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. What lies behind the cover is a riveting autobiographical account of John Perkinsʼ life as an “economic hit-man”, or more plainly, a professional paid to convince countries of strategic importance to the U.S. to accept massive loans for infrastructure and development – with the unspoken intention that they will subsequently become ensnared in a web of debt ensuring their loyalty to the U.S. global empire, or “corporatocoracy,” as Perkins repeatedly refers to it.
The book is a revelation, weaving together To achieve the aims of the Millenthemes of globalisation, economics, decepnium Development Goals (MDGs) tion, corruption and intrigue. A personal through halving absolute poverty by reflection on his international travels and 2015 we need to consider the rights experiences in places as far-flung as Indoneand needs of persons with disabilities, while simultaneously preventing sia, Panama and Saudi Arabia, it elucidates the many causes of disabilities. Many the forces behind many recent historical medical student-run organisations al- events as well as the part he, and others like him, played in creating the world we live in ready manage programmes inclusive today. of people with disabilities. Find out more from your Developing World But far from being a glib rundown of ecoGroup or any other government or Fifty percent of disabilities are prenomic theory or a disinterested critique of NGO you support. You should find ventable and poverty-related. These globalisation, Confessions of an Economic out if they have a disability policy. include disabilities due to: malnutriHit Man is a fascinating character study Are the healthcare, education, water tion and limited access to vaccination and sanitation, vocational training, detailing the anatomy of Perkinsʼ personal programmes, poor hygiene, limited descent from volunteering with the Peace income generation programs, buildmaternal care, dangerous working Corps in Ecuador to becoming an Economic ings and everything else they proand living conditions and war and Hit-Man in a seductive world of duplicvide fully accessible to people with conflict. It is accordingly imperative ity, money, elitism and ruthlessness. The disabilities? Does your group have to improve the overall living condigovernmental lie that “economic progress” access to practical information that tions of people living in poverty to is good and a global empire is desirable can help make their programs disimprove their health outcomes. By become driven by greed and complicity, ability inclusive (see the ʻLinks and upscaling poverty prevention interResourcesʼ section in this issue)? It is as does Perkins himself. Remarkably, the ventions together with the improvepivotal factor in his downfall is not a lack imperative that we all recognise that ment of treatment and rehabilitation or loss of moral sense but rather his selfwe cannot ʻMake Poverty Historyʼ programs, the incidence and associat- without including people with disContinued page 4 ed costs of disabilities in the develop- abilities. “Poor people are disproportionately disabled, and people with disabilities are disproportionately poor” Robert Holzmann, Director of World Bankʼs Social Protection Department, 2001.