The floods continue to wreak havoc in the lives of Guyanese, destroying crops, livestock, households’ items, homes, businesses and livelihood.
The longer the water stays on the land the greater the risk to people’s health and restoring life to some semblance of normalcy. Whilst we are all affected to various degrees by the floods, we are collectively affected by the possibility of scarcity in food items, increase in prices, the risk of a public health crisis and increasing spread of the pandemic. The situation is dire and where the government has declared flood a national disaster the concomitant strategies that accompany disasters of such nature seem more piecemeal than comprehensive.
Flooding requires public education on safety and security and how to protect oneself. Mark Benschop plays a role in using his programme “Straight Up” to bring awareness to the situation which shows the how some communities are affected, the risk involved, potential losses and the public health threat that could inform actions at the level of government. Watch the situations in some part of Guyana.
