Aftermath Of Hurricane Maria In Puerto Rico

2024 Author: Steven Freeman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 08:15

On the morning of September 20, the powerful hurricane María made landfall in Puerto Rico and its islands. It was a storm with unprecedented fury that reached the Caribbean coast a few days after the passing of another devastating hurricane: Irma.

Initially, sources on the island estimated that the devastating weather phenomenon had left nine dead. But as would be verified later, human losses would be difficult to calculate accurately and immediately.

The death toll began immediately: in the town of Utuado, a landslide crossed the wall of a house where three elderly sisters took refuge, burying them alive, according to the New York Magazine, which in its January edition dedicates a special article to the aftermath of the hurricane on the island.

But as said report points out, calculating the deaths caused by the hurricane is quite a difficult task. And the island's fiscal crisis has further complicated the situation. As explained, the population of 3.4 million in Puerto Rico is more vulnerable, and has a weaker infrastructure than any other part of the United States. The island's per capita income is slightly man-made and far more deadly than the hurricane itself.

On January 1, the governor of Puerto Rico, Ricardo Rosselló, released through a statement that asked authorities to review in detail the list of all deaths reported on the island since Hurricane Maria. The count continues, but what is estimated is that the figures may eclipse the death toll caused by Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans in 2005.

According to New York Magazine, more than 1,800 people died there. Many of them drowned in the poorest neighborhoods of the city, when they were submerged due to the collapse of the levees and the retaining walls. Since Puerto Rico has fewer flat areas, the number of María's immediate deaths was substantially lower.

As the publication points out, part of the blame falls on the prolonged blackouts that the island suffered and that have triggered problems that are difficult to measure directly.

"On December 29 it was 100 days since the storm devastated the island, and it seems that at least half of the population of Puerto Rico still did not have electricity. The damage caused by prolonged power failure is even more serious in hospitals, "he says. “A study of power outages in Ghana over a five-year period found a 43 percent increase in patient mortality during the days that a health care facility loses power for more than two hours. But the lack of electricity causes problems for the whole society: more stress, more diseases, more accidents."

Various sources have calculated that the death toll from the hurricane exceeds 1,000. The New York Times reported an increase of 1,052 deaths in the first 42 days alone by reviewing mortality data from previous years.

But the worst is not over yet: The authors of the report point out that experts in Puerto Rico have warned about the growing mosquito population and the lack of drinking water, and that they will increase with the hot season on the island.

"Puerto Rico is at risk of an epidemic. Although [President] Donald Trump's widespread response has been to ignore the problem, his presidency faces a historic tragedy, "the publication notes. "By the time the island returns to normal, Maria may have overtaken Katrina to become the deadliest natural disaster in the country's contemporary history."