Poor indoor air quality a potentially explosive health crisis in the Caribbean

By Dr Valma Jessamy


On the outside the sunny Caribbean is known for its hot balmy weather mediated by cool island breeze, creating a literal tropical paradise. On the inside lurks the real culprit -- high humidity and temperatures and the ever present mildew.

Because our building designs, laws, regulations and building codes have not taken into consideration the combination of outdoor and indoor air quality, workers and employers are now forced into an unnecessary standoff. Consequently, the Caribbean is on the verge of a worsening trend of sick building syndrome (SBS) as workers in several islands threaten employers with labour action unless they take serious stock of the poor quality of indoor air in their workplaces.

Oil refinery workers in Curacao, government ministry workers in Trinidad and Tobago and Grenada, lawyers and laboratory technicians in St Lucia even teachers in Barbados have all either walked off the job or have threatened labour action because they say the buildings in which they are working is making them sick.

With the exception of Barbados, the Caribbean islands have retained the Factory Act, a relic of the colonial era as the sole regulator of worker safety. Even though Barbados reformed the Factory Act and replaced it with an updated modern version to reflect concern for workers’ occupational health and safety issues, since 2003, the teachers’ union has been warning Barbadian officials of the worsening condition of buildings where teachers work.

As recent news reports have shown, government workers in Trinidad, St Lucia and Grenada have had to resort to labor action even in the facilities occupied by the people who are responsible for making policies that ought to protect employers and workers.

The existing legal standard for determining building quality in the Caribbean, the Caribbean Uniform Building Code (CUBIC), succeeds in its focus on structural designs of buildings, identifies hazards in construction and in the performance of air conditioning mechanical ventilation systems. But CUBIC fails to provide a complete regime for indoor air quality, though it recommends the number of vents and windows in rooms and areas of various sizes. This is not the sole fault of CUBIC but the aggravated failures of local architects and engineers to construct buildings with the occupants foremost in mind and of course the lack of occupational health and safety laws.

Since indoor air quality testing is not required by law in the Caribbean, employers face the double disadvantage of not knowing the status of their facilities and becoming aware of a problem only when their workforce succumb to illnesses. And the bottom lines suffer too because sick workers means loss of productive time and larger payments for health costs and insurance premiums. Even worse, business face the prospect of reputational injury as qualified workers will opt out of employment opportunities with employers regarded as neglectful of their employee's health and safety.

Sick building syndrome or SBS, refers to a range of symptoms from headaches, allergies, dizziness, fatigue and nausea to severe cases of respiratory ailments like asthma and lung infections caused by exposure to poor indoor air. A building is referred to as being sick, when there is evidence of a combination of high temperatures, humidity and high levels of pollutants.

Once upon a time there was the idealized Caribbean style building, with its louvered windows, later replaced by ventilated blocks -- to increase ventilation of the inside and reduce the buildup of pollutants. Today, the changing architecture of both commercial and residential buildings in the Caribbean is reflected in an artificial need to keep inside cool or keep insects out, so that new buildings are constructed with poor natural ventilation and the consequential accumulation of indoor air pollutants.

Indoor air quality (IAQ) is an ignored aspect of environmental health and management. We often think of the outdoor environment as the only space that needs to be managed for healthy living. However, with more time spent indoors, there is growing evidence that the quality of the indoor environment has a significant impact on human health.

Of course IAQ is affected by the quality of the outdoor air too. For example, a building located along a busy roadway can be affected by vehicle exhaust and dust, which, if allowed to become trapped on the inside, presents a serious case of polluted indoor air.

IAQ is also affected by physical, biological and chemical contaminates such as: dust particles, pollen, respiratory wastes of its occupants, breakdown and release of chemicals from building materials and electronic equipment, burning of fuel for cooking, animal dander from pets and pests, bacteria, viruses and fungi.

Building design affects ventilation, which in turn affects indoor temperatures, humidity and concentration of pollutants trapped inside. Good building design allows frequent air exchanges with outdoor air or "breathing" of the indoor space so that stale air and contaminants can be flushed out and replaced with cleaner fresher air.

In many commercial buildings, ventilation is done by mechanical means through the use of an air handling unit (AHU) as part of a heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) system. Contrary to popular belief, split air conditioning units (AC) do not provide ventilation of buildings. They function only to cool air and remove some dust particles and reduce humidity in limited cases.

To solve the worsening trend of sick building syndrome quickly we need to perform indoor air quality assessments at least once every year and conform building renovations to standards that are suitable for tropical environments. CUBIC has referenced the North American building design standards when the wiser thing to do is turn to other standards more applicable to the tropical conditions our workers and employers must deal with here at home.

The Caribbean Public Health Agency and its network of government agencies and health institutions recently launched a Caribbean Wellness Day. This initiative must be broadened to include IAQ and occupation health and safety since on average we spend more than 90% of our day indoors. Compared to food and other nutritional intake, air is the largest substance ingested by the human body. An individual can survive for several weeks without [food] and water but only minutes without air.

April 6, 2011

caribbeannewsnow

Bahamas Blog International

Regional integration and its importance to the growth of the Bahamian economy...

Arthur: Integration important to Bahamas economy



Former prime minister and current leader of the opposition in Barbados Owen Arthur recently expressed his sentiments about regional integration and its importance to the growth of the Bahamian economy.

“Removal of trade barriers is essential for the development and advancement of the Bahamian economy if we intend to be more involved in the global economy,” Arthur said. “The Bahamas can play an integral role in the development of the Caribbean region and the economies of its member states if they understand and maximize their full potential in the ways they can contribute to regional development.”

Arthur made his comments during a meeting in Barbados with Tyson Mckenzie, president of the Bahamas National Youth Council (BNYC), on March 31st, 2011. During the meeting, the ways in which the Bahamian youth and citizenry at large should prepare themselves for regional integration was discussed.

It was further noted by Arthur that the Bahamian people do have legitimate concerns, such as fiscal issues, labor mobility and social dislocation, with regards to the reservations of the involvement into the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME). He noted that when he was the prime minister of Barbados and a guest speaker at a town hall forum in The Bahamas, Bahamians expressed a fear of the influx of Caribbean nationals into their country.

However, he urged that if The Bahamas intends to increase its presence in international organizations and/or agreements it must first allow itself to see if its economy is prepared to handle the demands of other economies when it liberalizes its barriers for open trade.

“The Bahamas is moving backwards with reference to signing onto these international arrangements and agreements,” Arthur said. “It should work the other way around, The Bahamas should first explore the means of liberalizing its economy with its own brothers and sisters who have their true interest at heart.

“By doing this, The Bahamas is preparing itself for the international integration with other countries and better and more substantial involvement in international organizations such as the WTO, EPA and others.”

Arthur also mentioned that the Bahamian economy can also benefit from the rights of establishment. It was mentioned that the Bahamian economy has a struggling agriculture industry and it should be moving towards diversification. Noting that The Bahamas depends heavily on the tourism industry and customs as its main sources of revenue, when integrated into certain international trading agreements this would result in the removal of tariffs and barriers related to the free movement of goods and services.

4/5/2011

thenassauguardian

Bahamas Blog International

The Jamaican extradition enquiry - was it worth it?

by Oscar Ramjeet


As the Dudus/Manatt Enquiry comes to an end in Jamaica, one wonders if the well publicised and talked about enquiry was worth it -- not only in terms of its high cost, but the verbal abuse and clashes between lawyers, politicians, and even public servants.

Even those who advocated the setting up of the commission of enquiry felt that the exercise was not worth it -- the entire proceedings turned out to be a farce, a gimmick, and a platform to criticise and embarrass government officials, including the head of government, prime minister Bruce Golding, and the administration's chief legal advisor, the attorney general and minister of justice Dorothy Lightbourne.

Reports from Kingston state that the setting up of the commission of enquiry was political suicide for Prime Minister Bruce Golding and his Jamaica Labour Party administration.

People's National Party's lawyer, K.D. Knight QC, was on centre stage, using his legal position to embarrass Golding and Lightbourne, who had no choice but to take the "blows" and answer the questions, although the same questions were repeated over and over and at one stage the prime minister refused to answer after being accused of being a liar.

Political analyst Kevin Chang said that Knight's behaviour has distracted from the issues being probed at the proceedings and said that the Queen's Counsel’s behaviour was out of order and he was rude to the prime minister, the minister of justice and others. Chang made a comment that raised eyebrows when he said, "The commissioners have also been timid about making firm rulings against Knight for fear of appearing biased because they were chosen by government."

Why should these honourable and distinguished members of the Commission be timid? Knight is so powerful. He is a senator, a top notch lawyer and served as minister of foreign affairs and foreign trade as well as minister of national security, but that does not give him licence to bully his way.

He has certainly transformed the enquiry into a different direction, instead of trying to ascertain the reason for the delay in extraditing Coke, and if it was the government of Jamaica retained the law firm of Manatt, Phelps and Phillips or the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), and who should be blamed for the death of more than 70 persons.

Lightbourne made some serious statements that should be tested when she blamed the deputy director of public prosecutions Jeremy Taylor and solicitor general Douglas Leys.

However, what was worse was the battering of the prime minister by KD Knight and at times milking the enquiry for all the political fuel he could wring out of it. Surely Golding, before he set up the commission, must have thought that he would have to testify and he would be cross-examined.

One commentator who was at the enquiry said, "I felt ashamed, seeing him being visibly rankled and literally crying out." The commentator asked, "Did he not know that was Knight's objective? To psychologically destabilise him, to up his pressure, to get him red in the face and then to do so in front of the nation. Did he not see it coming?”

The entire fiasco was being televised for the entire nation to see. Was that a good move?

The Jamaica Council of Churches has also weighed in and chided Knight and others for their "tasteless behaviour" and comments at the enquiry.

The government has allocated JA$37 million for the enquiry, but another $21 million has been added to it and this might not be enough because the exercise has taken more than double the time it had anticipated, no doubt because of the line of cross examination.

April 4, 2011

caribbeannewsnow

Bahamas Blog International

Men and women in relationships display 19th century behaviour while communicating with 21st century technology

Gender inequalities 'greatly impact rate women contract HIV'
By NOELLE NICOLLS
Tribune Staff Reporter
nnicolls@tribunemedia.net




THE gender inequalities that women face are still a major challenge to eradicating HIV/AIDS related deaths, said gender experts at a symposium yesterday.

Audrey Ingram Roberts, a consultant at the Joint United Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), said adolescent girls do not have power to have safe sex.

She said they often have to resort to "seduction" as a means of negotiating condom use - an arrangement that does not create the necessary "shift in values" in male partners for them to support safe sexual activity.

She said women more often compromise their values, and become comfortable with the notion that "I am his main girl" or "I know him now."

Ms Roberts said women's rights are often reduced to a matter of "equality by numbers," or having equal representation of women and men from a numerical point of view.

She said that was the "lowest concept of equality" and virtually meaningless.

The irony of the world today, she said, is the fact that men and women in relationships display 19th century behaviour while communicating with 21st century technology.

She said the cell phone has become the quintessential symbol of that condition: a man buys a woman a cell phone so he can track her whereabouts at all times and monitor who she is in communication with.

Lynette Deveaux of the Women's Bureau said the dynamics surrounding cell phone use say a lot about the ideological shifts that are needed.

While some women are offended by the thought of a partner interrogating them over the use of their cell phone, she said many female adolescents are flattered by the thought, because they see jealousy as a symbol of love.

Ms Roberts said material relations that centre on the question of "What do you have?" or "What can you give me?" have replaced an ideological focus on the core beliefs of men and women about who they are and what roles they play.

She said the transformation that needs to take place to empower women and have them exercise their sexual and reproductive rights must be on an ideological level.

In the Caribbean, 48 per cent of persons living with HIV are women, according to UNAIDS. Women are 2.5 times more likely to be infected with HIV than young men.

"Challenges that prevent women and girls from accessing care, treatment and support include: gender violence and domestic violence; threats of abandonment; low levels of literacy; laws that prohibit sexually active adolescents and teenage girls from accessing care; lack of adolescent friendly health care services; stigma and discrimination; lack of support from other women; and ignoring the basic human rights of women and girls," said Sandra Smith, national programme officer at the UNAIDS Bahamas office.

The mandate of UNAIDS is to assist governments in the development and implementation of detailed action plans to fight AIDS. UNAIDS has developed its 2011-2015 strategy with the theme of "Getting to Zero". By 2015 the vision is to: "Get to zero new infections; get to zero AIDS related deaths; get to zero discrimination."

"One of the challenges to prevent this from happening is the gender inequalities that women face on a daily basis. Gender inequalities greatly impact the rate that women and girls contract HIV. Addressing these inequalities, the needs and rights of women and girls, is critical to achieving universal access and the Millennium Development Goals (MDG)," said Ms Smith.

Friday, April 01, 2011

tribune242

Bahamas Blog International

Haiti Needs Help To Prosecute Duvalier

News Americas, Washington, D.C.



Haiti’s justice minister says the country will need help from international judges to prosecute former dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier.

Andre Antoine told the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights this week that Haiti’s judges and prosecutors lack the training and experience necessary to handle a case of crimes against humanity, such as Duvalier is accused of committing during his reign more than 25 years ago.

“We recognize that our justice system is weak and needs to be reinforced,” said Antoine. “The magistrates are players in this game, it is like a football match: if they don’t have a good manager, it will be difficult to win.”

Antoine added that prosecution of Duvalier for human rights violations was of international importance.

“It is not only a Haitian matter, because convicting Duvalier would send a psychological message to humanity, to all the dictators or to those who are tempted by power (that) the law will not pardon them, that punishments await them,” he said.

Meanwhile, former justice minister Jean-Joseph Exume told the commission that 16 individual cases had been filed against Duvalier in the court system starting immediately after his January 16 return to the country from 25 years of exile.

The comments come as Duvalier was released from a Port-Au-Prince hospital where he had been hospitalized since last week.

Thurs. Mar. 31, 2011

newsamericasnow

Bahamas Blog International

Communist Cuba's First Lady: The Caribbean woman debunked

By Rebecca Theodore


It is clear that the political movements of the last decade only continue to undermine revolutionary movements and social welfare programs. However, as nation states are regraphed and ethnic and religious groups continue to compete for power, the political and physical conditions of women come to light.

In this regard, the eminence of Vilma Lucila Espín, wife of Raul Castro, sister-in-law of Fidel Castro, and one of the most influential women in Cuban politics, beams the beholder into a mirrored reflection of a woman who turned herself into a revolutionary during the Cuban revolution. Her involvement in a group headed by Frank País in opposition to the Fulgencio Batista dictatorship -- an informal revolutionary group that later merged with Fidel Castro's 26th of July movement is of special note.

Under País's command, “Deborah”, as she became known, prepared first aid brigades to care for the wounded once the yacht Granma arrived in Cuba carrying Castro and his associates. Espín worked underground for the revolution in Santiago, transporting weapons to the rebels in the Sierra Maestra. When Frank País was killed by the Batista army, Espín worked as an aide to Raul Castro, helping him coordinate clandestine work and guerilla operations in Oriente Province. In 1958, she joined the Castro guerrillas in the mountains under the name of “Mariela.”

As an esteemed figure of the revolution, the image of Ms Espín shouldering rifle and wearing combat fatigues during the rebel war helped change the attitude about the role of women in Cuba. Sadly enough, an androcentric society in Cuba represses Ms Espin’s struggle for women’s leadership rights as reason continues to dominate the controlling aspect of self-embodiment, passions and even history itself.

The dichotomy between women and reform in Communist Cuba will never be understood without the illuminated portrayal of Ms Espín’s leadership role on the pages of Cuban history, because in the same way reason is that which is given as an understanding to reality, the split between objectivity and subjectivity to discern reality in the patriarchal regime that now defines Cuba still sees women on the side of the less valued.

The way in which reality is conceived and played out in the everyday life of Cuban women in Cuba is not only manifested in oppression, exclusion and exploitation, reducing them to mere stereotypes and registering reason as an instrument of oppression, but subjugation of the female body buried in socialist ideology must be liberated as well. Ms Espín has achieved for women in Cuba what liberal feminists in the west are still fighting for, yet her achievements remain concealed by the intricacies of language and male domination in Cuba.

Although the Federation of Cuban Women (La Federacion de Mujeres Cubanas) (FMC), the organization founded by Ms Espin, has been essential in advancing both gender equalization and health improvement for women, and its recognition as both an NGO and a national mechanism for women gains wide support, the vast majority of Cuban women, who represent 46 percent of the country’s work force, are still not government supported or financed.

Active participation and training of leaders at all levels, mobilizing women into political work and government administration and domination of human rights in Cuba is still needed to complete the work of Vilma Lucila Espín.

In a country where speaking about human rights is an ideological deviance, the traditional role of morality and justice that Ms Espín demonstrated during the Cuban revolution must be highlighted. Ms Espín not only occupied the role of relief and support to her revolutionary male leaders as has been documented in Cuban history, but is a beacon of hope to all the women who are presently suffering against gender inequalities in Cuba and the Caribbean at large and further strengthens the women’s movement in the Caribbean.

Moreover, if the mission of the FMC is strengthening women's rights, fighting for the incorporation, participation, and promotion of women in economic, political, social, and cultural life in Cuba based on equal rights and opportunities; then over fifty years of revolution must be enough to have produced a keenly politicized Cuban woman capable of deep analysis, and concise projection to take the reins of leadership in Cuba and to work out solutions collectively for the Cuban people.

If Cuba under the leadership of the FMC has obtained for women everything that the movement for women’s right is presently asking for in an open 21st century, then why are Cuban women equal yet different and still totally excluded from the public square?

March 30, 2011

caribbeannewsnow

Bahamas Blog International

Between emigration and crime

Reflections of Fidel

Taken from CubaDebate

LATIN Americans are not innate criminals and neither did they invent drugs.

The Aztecs, Mayas and other pre-Columbian peoples of Mexico and Central America, for example, were excellent agriculturalists and knew nothing about coca cultivation.

The Quechuas and Aymaras were capable of producing nutritive foods on perfect terraces which followed the curves of the mountain levels. On altiplanos sometimes in excess of 3-4,000 meters high, they cultivated quinoa, a cereal rich in protein, and potatoes.

They also knew and cultivated the coca plant, the leaves of which they have chewed since time immemorial in order to alleviate the rigor of the heights. It was a millennial custom practiced by peoples with products such as coffee, tobacco, liquor and others.

Coca came originally from the steep mountain slopes of the Amazonian Andes. Their inhabitants knew it long before the Inca empire whose territory, in its maximum splendor, extended over the current territory of southern Colombia, all of Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, eastern Chile and northeastern Argentina; close to two million square kilometers.

The consumption of coca leaves became a privilege of the Inca emperors and the nobility in religious ceremonies.

When the empire disappeared after the Spanish invasion, the new masters encouraged the traditional habit of chewing coca leaves in order to extend the working days of the indigenous labor force, a right that lasted until the UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs prohibited the use of coca leaves, except for medical or scientific purposes.

Almost all countries signed it. Barely any health related issue was discussed. The trafficking of cocaine had not yet reached its current enormous magnitude. Extremely serious problems have been created in the years that have passed since, which demand profound analyses.

On the thorny issue of the relationship between drugs and organized crime the UN itself delicately affirms that Latin America is inefficient in combating crime.

Information published by distinct institutions is varied, given that the matter is a sensitive one. The data are sometimes so complex and varied that they can lead to confusion. However, there is not the slightest doubt that the problem is rapidly worsening.

Almost six week ago, on February 11, 2011, a report published in Mexico City by that country’s Citizens’ Council for Public Safety and Criminal Justice, provided interesting data on the 50 most violent cities in the world, on the basis of homicides committed in 2010. It confirms that Mexico furnishes 25% of them. For the third consecutive year No. 1 falls to Juarez, on the border with the United States.

It goes on to say that, "… in that year the rate of criminal homicides in Juarez was 35% higher than that of Kandahar, Afghanistan – No. 2 in the ranking – and 941% higher than that of Baghdad…"; in other words, almost 10 times that of the Iraqi capital, a city at No. 50 on the list.

It almost immediately adds that the city of San Pedro Sula in Honduras lies in third place with 125 homicides for every 100,000 inhabitants; only exceeded by Juarez, in Mexico, with 229; and Kandahar in Afghanistan, with 169.

Tegucigalpa, Honduras, is in sixth place, with 109 homicides for every 100,000 inhabitants.

Thus, it can be observed that Honduras, with the yankee Palmerola airbase, where a coup d’état took place during Obama’s presidency, has two cities among the six in which the most homicides in the world take place. The rate in Guatemala City stands at 106.

According to the abovementioned report, the Colombian city of Medellín, with 87.42 likewise figures among the most violent in the Americas and the world.

U.S. President Barack Obama’s speech in El Salvador and his subsequent press conference, obliged me to publish these lines on the issue.

In my March 21 Reflection I criticized his lack of ethics for not even mentioning in Chile the name of Salvador Allende, a symbol of dignity and courage for the world, who died as the consequence of a coup d’état promoted by a president of the United States.

As I knew that the following day he was to visit El Salvador, a Central American country symbolic of the struggles of the peoples of Our America, which has suffered the most as a result of U.S. policy in our hemisphere, I said, "There he will have to invent a lot, because in that sister Central American nation the weapons and advisors that it received from his country were responsible for much bloodshed."

I wished him bon voyage and "a little more good sense." I have to admit that, on his lengthy tour, he was a little bit more careful during the final stretch.

Monsignor Oscar Arnulfo Romero was a man admired by all Latin Americans, believers or non-believers, as were the Jesuit priests cowardly assassinated by the henchmen that the United States trained, backed and armed to the teeth. In El Salvador, the FMLN, a militant left-wing organization, waged one of the most heroic struggles on our continent.

The Salvadorian people gave the victory to the Party which emerged from the heart of those glorious combatants, whose profound history remains to be constructed.

What is urgent is to confront the dramatic dilemma being experienced by El Salvador, just like Mexico, the rest of Central America and South America.

Obama himself stated that approximately two million Salvadorians live in the United States, equivalent to 30% of the country’s population. The brutal repression unleashed on patriots and the systematic plunder of El Salvador imposed by the United States obliged hundreds of thousands of Salvadorians to emigrate to that territory.

What is new is that the desperate situation of Central Americans has been compounded by the immense power of terrorist gangs, sophisticated weapons and the demand for drugs, created by the U.S. market.

In his brief remarks preceding those of the visitor, the President of El Salvador stated textually, "I insisted to him that the issue of organized crime, drug trafficking, citizen insecurity is not an issue that solely concerns El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras or Nicaragua, or even Mexico or Colombia; it is an issue which concerns us as a region, and in that context we are working on building a regional strategy, via the CARFI Initiative."

"…I insisted to him that this is an issue that cannot be approached solely from the perspective of pursuing crime by strengthening our police and armies, but also by emphasizing crime prevention policies and therefore, the best weapon for combating crime in itself, in the region, is by investing in social policies."

In his response, the U.S. leader said, "President Funes is committed to creating more economic opportunities here in El Salvador so that people don’t feel like they have to head north to provide for their families."

"I know this is especially important to the some 2 million Salvadoran people who are living and working in the United States."

"…I updated the President on the new consumer protections that I signed into law, which give people more information and make sure their remittances actually reach their loved ones back home.

"Today, we’re also launching a new effort to confront the narco-traffickers and gangs that have caused so much violence in all of our countries, and especially here in Central America. "

"…we’ll focus $200 million to support efforts here in the region, including addressing, as President Funes indicated, the social and economic forces that drive young people towards criminality. We’ll help strengthen courts, civil society groups and institutions that uphold the rule of law."

I do not need any more words to express the essence of a painfully sad situation.

The reality is that many young Central Americans have been led by imperialism to cross an inflexible and constantly more impassable border, or to provide services to the millionaire drug trafficking gangs.

Would it not be more just – I wonder – to have an Adjustment Act for all Latin Americans, like the one invented almost 50 years ago now to punish Cuba? Will the number of persons who die crossing the U.S. border and the tens of thousands who are dying every year in the nations to which you are offering an "Alliance of Equals" continue to grow ad infinitum?



Fidel Castro Ruz

March 25, 2011

8:46 p.m.

Translated by Granma International

granma.cu

Bahamas Blog International