Opinion
15 MARCH 2021
Texas’ seven-day ice age shows the disparate politics of climate change Camila Consolmagno & Frederick Thelen, LLB & BA International Relations Recently, the state of Texas suffered through a historical event already being termed the ‘2021 Texas Power Crisis.’ This, however, fails to convey the scale of the crisis. Energy in Texas is managed on a state level as it has a power grid independent from the rest of the US. Triggered by two different February winter storms, the crisis led to state-wide power cuts when the energy grid was threatened with complete collapse due to greater demand than could be supplied. The consequential colossal surge in wholesale electricity left at least 70 dead and many unanswered questions. As a result of the freezing conditions, many wind turbines, coal piles and natural gas wells froze. Gas pipelines also became blocked. Coupled with a rise in demand, this led to a heat and electricity shortage as controlled blackouts were instituted to save the overall energy grid from a complete meltdown. Facing a 10,000% increase in the price of wholesale electricity, millions of Texans were forced to cut their own power. For those that could afford it, bills surged to $400-500 daily. For many, that meant an erasure of their life savings. As a consequence of Covid-19, Texans were already facing unprecedented financial difficulties. This unforeseen tragedy has only exacerbated them. The most vulnerable were left out in the cold - the elderly, the poor and the homeless were the most at risk. This quickly led to the state providing ‘emergency warming centers’ to help
residents find shelter, though many struggled meeting Covid-19 safety standards amid the emergency. In Houston, more than 500 people crowded into a single shelter. Many other centers, however, had to be shut due to unaidable power loss. As with many crises, the devastation served to amplify pre-existing inequalities. Amongst the dead was an 11-year-old boy who died attempting to keep his 3-year-old brother warm. Critical infrastructure was exempt from the long-term blackouts, meaning that residents in denser, more affluent areas with hospitals did not have to scramble for heat or electricity. Importantly, the ‘Texas Freeze’ exposed the unpreparedness and willful ignorance of decision-makers in the face of exponentially increasing climate risks. Does this come as a surprise? Scientists have been warning for decades that these disasters would occur with the strength and frequency we are now experiencing if nothing was done. Far too many governments have been complacent, negligent and denialist. Texas itself is an example of this. After a winter storm of similar severity occurred in 2011 and caused widespread blackouts, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas allegedly ignored a report compiled by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that called for the state to prepare the energy grid for instances of extreme cold weather. The fatal consequences of climate change-induced weather were not just apparent but avoidable. Arguably, no place is a more fitting symbol of climate denialism and its futility in the face of evermore extreme weather events than Texas. It is the seed of the US oil industry, which for so long funded research
Bank of America amid Dallas snow, 2021. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)
denying their businesses’ impact on the climate and discrediting science all while actively lobbying against renewable energies in Austin, Washington D.C. and beyond. It is thus unsurprising that numerous lawmakers - among them Republican Senator Ted Cruz, who saw fit to abandon the emergency his constituents faced in the freezing cold for warmer, more luxurious pastures abroad - used the disaster to back the fossil fuel industry by blaming the event on the failure of renewable energy sources in the extreme cold. This untrue claim is an attempt to protect the Texas oil industry, the local government’s most prominent backers. The Centre for Responsive Politics reported that Senator
Cruz received $1,388,417 in political donations from the Oil & Gas industry from 2015 to 2020 alone. The fallout and unfolding battle over renewable energy and fossil fuels highlights the need for responsible, science-driven governance that prioritises the wellbeing of the people it serves in the face of mounting challenges and growing inequality. Amidst the current talk of proofing society against future pandemics, policy-makers would do well to heed the examples of Texas, California and others, and adjust governance to take seriously, prevent and mitigate the unequal consequences of climate changeinduced weather patterns. Lives depend on it.
The tragic history of American medicine failing the Black community Zahra Jawad, BA Politics and Economics Content warning: surgical procedures and medical negligence If 2021 has shown us anything, it is the incredible capacity for clinical innovations at the heart of modern medicine. Several Covid-19 vaccines, developed with cutting-edge technology, have been approved and widely manufactured in just a matter of months. Our ability to quickly address and remedy illness and disease has exponentially grown in the last century. While many are quick to celebrate these achievements, their significance is often heightened by our ignorance; a dark history lies behind the frameworks of Western medicine. Like American policing, institutionalised racism still lingers within modern medicine. Even after slavery was abolished in America in 1865, the barbarism that haunted Black citizens remained prevalent. Medical schools and research centers were known to rely on theft of Black bodies to use as anatomical material, a practice that continued into the early 20th century. The veneration of America’s ‘father’ of modern-day gynecology shows us the extent to which we are prepared to ignore the racist history of medicine. J. Marion Sims, an American physician, revolutionised modern day gynaecology and is credited with developing the surgical procedure to fix Vesicovaginal Fistula (VVF) – a tear occurring between the
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uterus and bladder. Sims’ achievements came at the cost of many - he was known to have partaken in a wide range of gruesome procedures involving Black women. During the 1830s, Sims perfected the surgery for VVF after carrying out the procedure on enslaved women, such as Anarcha Westcott who is infamously depicted in the painter Robert Thom’s ‘Great Moments in Medicine’ series, without their consent. A paper published by the Journal of Medical Ethics found that Sims didn’t use anaesthesia when carrying out the operation, often resulting in the women dying of shock if they hadn’t already succumbed to internal bleeding. This was practiced by many doctors alike and led to a dangerous ideology within medicine that persists today - that the white man feels pain differently from his Black counterpart. Charles Hamilton Smiths’ The Natural History of the Human first codified this idea, stating that ‘the darker American races can tolerate pain unbearable to that of the white man.’ A study conducted by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) found that a staggering 40% of first and second year medical students believed that Black people’s skin was thicker than White people’s. Myths continue to circulate that Black people’s nerve endings are less sensitive long after Sims’ practice came to be seen as barbaric. Serena Williams’ shocking story of the birth of her daughter is an appalling example of the persistence of these myths. Williams, who had a history of blood clots, began to
deteriorate shortly after undergoing an emergency Caesarean section. She pleaded with doctors to give her a CT scan and administer IV heparin, but her nurse assumed Williams’ pain medication was making her delusional. When she finally convinced her Doctors to send her for a CT scan, it revealed several blood clots had settled in her lungs. Williams says she was lucky; for many Black women, this stigma around their pain proves fatal. Black women are the primary victims of the racial prejudices that exist within medicine. According to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Black mothers in the US die at 3 to 4 times the rate of white mothers during childbirth. Mass immigration to America in the 1930s contributed to the birth of the eugenics movement which aimed to curb the proliferation of non-White births. During this time, the Supreme Court upheld forced sterilisation laws for African Americans and other ethnic minorities in 32 states. A horrific 20,000 men and women belonging to minorities underwent the sterilisation procedure without their knowledge and it was only during the mid-Twentieth Century that the practice came to be seen as a barbaric product of pseudo-science. Institutionalised racism in medicine still persists and despite growing awareness and the rise of anti-racism movements in the last two decades, skepticism and fear still linger in the traumatised Black community and other minority groups.
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