Outside Reading 3: Disease

A common trend that kept showing up in the book They Poured Fire on us from the Sky is one of disease. Nearly every last boy that told his story in the book had a disease or was stuck in a work camp because they had to help their friends and family that would die without their help. An example of how horrible some of the camps such as Kakuma, which was a refugee camp, was in a quote from one of the Lost Boys stating "nutritional diseases were rampant in the camp". Another one of the Lost Boys, Alepho, described his experience of when he got malaria. Since he did not receive the malaria shot he was sick for weeks upon weeks to get over. Many of the diseases that were found in the different camps or that were caused from running from the war could have been easily prevented. When kids in my school get sick they go home where they are safe from other diseases and sicknesses/germs and will try to get better by taking different antibiotics. One of the Lost Boys got pink eye and it took months to heal because there was no way to keep away the sickness or any way to receive remedies that were available. On many of the Lost Boys travels, they recollected their travels through different swamps and their overall experience on the travels to different camps. One of the Lost Boys remembers specifically going through one river where many of the travelers in his group died from snake bites. This is not a sickness or disease yet many of those people could have been saved if there was access to antivenin which cures the body of venom from various snake bites. Diseases were very common in camps as one Lost Boy wrote "kids got malaria a lot and sometimes other diseases".  Malaria is preventable and a curable disease so it is very disappointing that so many children would receive malaria. If they did not receive the shots before they got malaria, it is quite possible that many of these children did not receive the antidote once they got malaria. The largest result from people not getting cured is death. More than half a million people die each year from malaria which is curable! Curable! This means that these deaths did not have to end this tragic way. This book brought awareness to diseases and nutritional inefficiencies which can be prevented and cured. Recognizing this, people can be prepared by finding places that can help with malaria and other disease protection. One simple way to prevent malaria is to sleep with bug nets so mosquitoes that are carriers of the the malaria disease cannot bite them. This is the 21st century, we have outgrown the inability to protect ourselves from many diseases and it is a duty for all people to help those who can be saved from preventable diseases. No person should have to die because of a curable disease because they do not have the resources or are unable to access the cure.