Another DUER suggested that I post this in GD for exposure.

[Arkansas Granny]

Hookworm, a disease of extreme poverty, is thriving in the US south. Why?

Children playing feet away from open pools of raw sewage; drinking water pumped beside cracked pipes of untreated waste; human faeces flushed back into kitchen sinks and bathtubs whenever the rains come; people testing positive for hookworm, an intestinal parasite that thrives on extreme poverty.

These are the findings of a new study into endemic tropical diseases, not in places usually associated with them in the developing world of sub-Saharan Africa and Asia, but in a corner of the richest nation on earth: Alabama.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/sep/05/hookworm-lowndes-county-alabama-water-waste-treatment-poverty

It's hard to believe that these conditions exist in a country as rich as the US.

[eleny]

1. Disease - the product of a lack of regulation

[dlwickham]

2. I'm not

you go to parts of my state and you'll see places that could easily be in a 3rd world country

one of the reasons that people turn to drugs like meth and crack back in the 80s-it kills the pain

[marybourg]

3. Many states. nt

[MustLoveBeagles]

4. K&R

[malaise]

5. It is only a major epidemic or pandemic that will stop these morons runningn the country

That is why sensible countries tax everyone o for the common good and public health is number one.

[volstork]

12. I'm not entirely sure

that even that would stop them. It would just be a convenient way to kill more "undesirables" off.

[not fooled]

20. A major depression or world war

that's what I think it will take to wake up the deplorables.

Although even when one or both happen, now we have the massive RWNJ hate propaganda machine in place to mislead 1/4-1/3 of the population. I don't think that armory of propaganda was in place during the Republican Great Depression in the '30s. If so, perhaps even Roosevelt couldn't have pulled the country out of it.

The next couple of elections are crucial. If the pukes retain control, we are going down the shithole, perhaps permanently.

[malaise]

28. These days I'm not sure you're wrong

UNtil their own kids get the diseases,they may ignore them or use them to spread more fear.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

31. Only if USPravdaInc. doesnt tell them it Obamas fault.

☹️

[malaise]

32. True

Happy Holidays BlancheSplanchnik

[BlancheSplanchnik]

33. Thanks malaise,

You too! ☺️💚🎄💚

[Stuart G]

6. k and r....right here in the U.S.A. very sad...

[PatrickforO]

7. This will be grist for me to call my US Rep and Senators tomorrow.

We can give out massive tax cuts for billionaires but we're too 'poor' to upgrade water treatment?

What's this about?

Hookworm?

This is AMERICA, for God's sake. We're better than this.

[ck4829]

10. Don't get your hopes up talking to them. Hookworm is a feature, not a bug (No pun intended), of

our economic reality and how our fake government in DC treats public health.

If hookworm was a disease that affected people regardless of social class, it would not be here in the US... just like how erectile dysfunction and "affluenza" just happen to not be on any list of "pre-existing conditions".

[NewJeffCT]

8. Reagan, Bush and then Trump

The GOP trifecta has led to this

[Martin Eden]

9. Freedumb

The "pro-life" party doesn't care if children die. The important thing is to increase shareholder value for their wealthy campaign contributors.

[Locut0s]

11. The US is only wealthy for the wealthy...

There are a number of other countries with higher standards of living for their average and poor citizenry. All you have to do is travel and you will see this.

[Sophia4]

16. So true.

It's still Christmas here.

What do these pseudoChristians think the story of the loaves and fishes is about.

It's about the fact that sharing with each other actually makes life better for everyone. There is plenty of everything when we apply our thinking and our work to sharing as well as to doing well for ourselves.

The true message of Christianity that so few hear.

[appalachiablue]

13. Big Kick & Rec for exposure. Disgraceful in this uber wealthy nation..

As kids we didn't know why dad was stern if we briefly played w/o wearing shoes. He knew; we realized much later.

[MsLeopard]

14. It seems

The US has become little more than a 3rd world shithole, existing solely for the purpose of enriching the already stinking rich even more so.

I weep for what our nation once stood for. As a child I felt lucky to have been born here. Today I’m embarrassed to live here. Sigh.

[not fooled]

21. Well put

and my sentiments exactly. That's why, on the day the senate passed the tax scam, I made the decision to emigrate.

The USA I grew up in is gone.

[Susan Calvin]

24. Where are you planning on going? nt

[not fooled]

25. Still researching countries

but the UK, New Zealand, and Canada are at the top of the list.

I'm going to apply as an entrepreneur or investor. The UK actually seems to have the lowest capital requirements and most straightforward pathway to citizenship. And yeah, they have a hereditary aristocracy, but so does the US--it's just overtly acknowledged in the UK. And despite having thatcherism/reaganism as does the US, the UK seems to work better and isn't being systematically dismantled like the U.S.

And, I'm just fed up with the hatefulness and meanness endemic in the US and grasp on power of the fake xtians. Even if Dems take back some control, it's not gonna end in my lifetime--just look at what the pukes did to President Obama. I've lived under tricky dick, raygun, the BFEE, and now this. I thought surely, after the disaster that was the chimpy presidency, no way would the country vote in another puke. And now look--they have control of everything, installed the orange turd, and just looted the treasury for trillions. I honestly don't see it ending and don't want to spend the rest of my life living under policies from these fuckers.

[Susan Calvin]

27. Amen. nt

[Sophia4]

15. Not hard for me to believe the report.

I actually lived in Alabama and traveling through to go home for college breaks, saw the poverty of rural Alabama.

It's really bad. And it exists amid relative wealth. There is no excuse for such inhumanity.

[Ninsianna]

17. I'm shocked this wasn't all over the place during the Alabama election.

[Heartstrings]

18. My thought exactly.........nt

[Ninsianna]

19. I posted on other platforms, I assumed it was posted here as well,

since it was making the rounds on twitter.

It gets worse, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/next/nature/how-a-worm-gave-the-south-a-bad-name/

[gratuitous]

22. I had an acquaintance do a walking tour of the country a few years ago

He'd post online about the day's events, where he'd been, some of the people he'd interacted with, and so forth. We supported him with money and Ben & Jerry's coupons. He was in (as I recall) Arkansas, and was going to crash for the night in a dilapidated, presumably empty, house. To his surprise, it was occupied. He posted a couple of photos, and I was surprised to think that a family was living in such a ramshackle residence.

I say this not to shame Arkansas, but to support the notion that there are people living in this country under the most hideous conditions. There are many reasons why this is so, but most of them are grounded in greed and shame.

[Vinca]

23. My brother purchased a purebred dog and recently found out it had hookworm.

I'd never heard of it in this country before.

[democratisphere]

26. Bound and determined to be a third world nation.

Outrageous!

[workinclasszero]

29. We are living in a Randian paradise thanks to republicans

Give it a couple of years, the rivers will be on fire once again and Flint water will be on tap for all.

MAGA baby!

[Nitram]

30. LBJ really tried to make America great with his war on poverty.

If he hadn't gone all in on the Vietnam war, it might well have worked.

[perdita9]

34. The federal govt ran a program to eradicate hookworm during the Great Depression

Or, as conservatives would put it, government interference in our freedom