The Destruction of a Slum Dweller’s Life

By: Jesse C. Hernandez

From: India

What is a slum and how does it affect the dwellers who live in it ?

The poor live in certain areas called “slums” and the people are sometimes referred to as dwellers.

More than half of India’s population lives in these slum areas.

The living conditions in the slums are horrendous, while the water drinkability is uncertain in many areas of the slums due to contamination.

The poor living conditions being so gruesome in the slums leads to devastating effects on their inhabitants.

Slum in India

.

What is the hygiene in slums like and how does it affect the people ?

The slums of India are destructive to hygiene if such a word exists in such an unsanitary place.

Many of the slum’s inhabitants live in poverty and the basic necessity of a running toilet.

“It is estimated that over one third of slum households have no access to bathroom facilities, promoting open defecation, which in turn leads to the spread of fecal-oral disease and parasitic infestation.” informs that the dwellers of the slums can gain certain disease from just defecting in a unsanitary area (Living Conditions in Indian Slums).

Diseases of fecal-oral disease and parasitic infestation can destroy the body for the inside out and if not treated correctly it can even result in death.

This problem of open defection due to the limited or no access to a restroom may also have a negative impact on the water throughout the slums.

The Water of the Slums

Water is one of the most significant basic human needs, if not the most important of them all.

With such a catastrophically horrible conditions in the slums the water may contain contaminates that can lead to the deterioration of the body.

In an article sponsored by Google it provides information that “In India, 15 hundred thousand children die each day because of diarrhea and every 15 seconds a children dies because a water related disease.” indicating that water disease in the slums of India kills whomever regardless or age or gender (Chamberlain).

The reason for disease to go untreated is because of the insufficient amount of willingness to seek proper health care.

Why do the dwellers of the slums lack access to healthcare ?

The dwellers of the slums lacking access to health care was a result of living in poverty and sometimes weren’t able to afford it. Among other reasons

some dwellers may not seek healthcare because they, “… are too far from hospitals to make use of their facilities, because they cannot afford to use

private auto-rickshaws to reach them and there is no public transport.” exemplifies furthermore that the slums isolate its inhabitants from the help that is needed. Proper health care is the deciding cause between a person

living or dying, and the slums influence the outcome. This concept also helps to explain whether a child lives or dies in the slums (Chamberlain).

How does not having healthcare affects the women who live in the

slums ? Many women who live in the slums baring a

child rarely have their child at the hospital due to the hardships associated with health care.

These women have their children in the slums leaving opportunity for infection, disease, which may lead to death.

In a Journal of Urban Health it makes a remake that “78% of women living in non-slums areas report institutional delivery, the figure is only 65% for slum areas.” one can infer that the other 45% percent did not have their child at institution, therefore the child was born in a slum (Hazarika).

With the survival of the child it will be always tied to the slums and the difficulties to come in its near future, but for the death of so many children born in the slums the mothers will always carry the pain of not having their child.

1st person account of from a slum

dweller

A 22- year old woman named Gudiya held her surviving daughter whose name is Priya. They live in a slum and it is covered with debris, some of it human and animal waste.

In four years 3 of her children have died. The most recent was a boy who died 2 days after she gave birth.

The mother said, “He cried, but it was feeble and he gradually turned cold.” showing the life leaving her son as she explains it.

The other two children died three years earlier. Her three-month-old son Ahmit died from pneumonia, and a year earlier her five-month-old daughter Kumkum died after developing fever.

This story shows the harsh realities of having a child in the slums. This is a live account from a woman who faces the struggles of the slums even though it has laid ruin to her life she continues to live in vicious cycle (Chamberlain).

This is a piece from a story of a young woman's life which was written in a article that was provided by The Guardian news.

The poverty in the slums create stress

on the dwellers that leads into

violence among each other

The slums create stress on the dwellers whom live in them, because the dwellers

live in poverty and the violence follows not far from behind. In the article it makes a

statement that, “One distressing factor and issue concern was the high prevalence of

child abuse, with 23.7% of children reporting abuse in the form of violence in the home or on the streets.” emphasizes

the point that the slum affects the inhabitants. When a child faces this kind of

violence it destroys their innocence and changes their stance in their life. But the

slums create more than one type of stress. One other type of stress, for example,

would be a lack of food (Viswanathan).

Malnutrition in the slums and affects it has on its inhabitants

The absence of food in the stomachs of the inhabitants of the slums is a common feeling of everyday life.

Poverty is the main cause for malnutrition because if people can pay for the food then they wont get what they need.

“Malnutrition is a significant problem among India woman. According to several studies that used the NFHS-3, only 52 percent of women were with in the normal weight rage for a given height. “ which demonstrates that the people in India don’t have a correct diet.

Later in the article it goes on to say “Women residing in non-slums areas were more likely to be over weight, whereas those who resides in the slums more likely to be underweight.” this quote shows the horrible eating habits that women have created for themselves an how the slums affect the way they eat (Swaminathan).

Closing remarks about how dwellers are affected by the slums

The impoverished conditions in the slums sometimes destroy the dwellers will to live and give them little hope of a brighter day. It leaves damaging effects on their inhabitants that will forever shape their lives.The dwellers have very poor hygiene throughout the slums and tend to not have access to clean restrooms which leads them to poor sanitation practices which also puts them at risk to attract certain diseases. The poor sanitation habits also leads to contamination of the water throughout the slums thus affecting the people who drink it. The dwellers that drink the water and get sick don’t seek health care because they lack the access to it. The reason for the lack of access is because it’s to far away or the dwellers can’t afford it. The story of the woman who has lost three children is important because it shows the result of not having health care. But health care isn’t the only stressor in the slums. There is also violence and malnutrition that are created in the slums due to the poverty that is found there. The slums affect the people who live in them. But will the slums change if the people who live there change?

 

Works cited Chamberlain, Gethin. "Two Million Slum Children Die Every Year as India Booms."

The Guardian. Guardian News and Media, 03 Oct. 2009. Web. 23 Oct. 2012. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/04/india-slums-children-death-rate>.

DE, JAYASREE. "Development, Environment and Urban Health in India." Development, Environment and Urban Health in India 92.2 (2007): 158-60. Jstor. Web.

Hazarika, Indrajit. "Women’s Reproductive Health in Slum Populations in India: Evidence From NFHS-3." Journal of Urban Health 87.2 (2010): 264-77. Print.

"Living Conditions in Indian Slums." Living Conditions in Indian Slums. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Oct. 2012. <https://sites.google.com/site/livingconditionsinindianslums/>.

Swaminathan, Hema, and Arnab Mukherji. "Slums And Malnourishment: Evidence From Women In India." American Journal Of Public Health 102.7 (2012): 1329-1335. Business Source Complete. Web. 23 Oct. 2012.

Viswanathan, Vijay, and Shabana Tharkar. "Can the Divide Be Bridged: Overview of Life in Urban Slums in India." Indian Journal of Community Medicine 35.1 (2010): 198. Print.