Essay Sample on Effects of Earthquake on the Pediatric Population Group

Introduction

An earthquake is the sudden shaking of the earth that occurs in the crust of the planet, and it leads to building up of stress, which might cause the deformation of rocks and weakness of the earth's surface. When an earthquake occurs, it leads to many damages in the world, and also, the pediatric children are affected, physically, and mentally. This paper is about the effect of the earthquake on the pediatric population group. This might make the affected children become even more sensitive to the sound and trembling of the earth, and also their daily activities might be affected due to this sensitivity.

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Mental Health

If a natural catastrophe occurs, the first activities of the emergency reaction group are to make sure they offer the essential human wants for the affected people and start the quest and the rescue procedure. The response team is said to ignore one of the essential aspects, which are to talk about mental health matters that might occur after the disaster. For example, when an earthquake occurred in South Asia on the 25th of April 2015, it was recorded that around 8890 people died due to aftershocks (Schwind, Jessica S., et al 54). Children who witness natural calamities are not immune to the danger of evolving mental health complications, and they are most likely to be affected by trauma. In developed nations, the mental health glitches of children might reach epidemic levels of they experience a natural disaster, and these problems might last for a very long period and hence causing lifelong infirmities. Most of these children who witness an earthquake on their families suffer post-traumatic stress disorder and also stress. This is because they saw their homes being displaced away, or even their family members succumb to death.

Physical Health

An earthquake affects people in various ways. Most people in the pediatric population who are affected mostly by the earthquake are the children. The disease that affects the pediatric population mostly is pneumonia and lung infections. For example, when an earthquake occurred in Sumatra in the year 2009, the army team from Singapore said that around 47 % of the patients were infected with pneumonia and upper breathing problems. Also, diarrhea is common in children within the pediatric population. A study was conducted, and the researchers found that more than 40 % of the people who were staying in camps died due to diarrheal diseases if the situation was an emergency, and 80 % of these deaths were of children who were below two years old (Giri, Bishnu Rath, et al 28). Most of the children who experienced earthquakes have streptococcal contagion, most probably of the throat, and this contamination increases in frequency with the time passage. Those children who suffer from nephrogenic anxieties are most likely to be affected by acute glomerulonephritis.

Lack of Resources

When an earthquake occurs, it might be so severe that many families are displaced, and they have to live in a camp. They are displaced from their homes, and since they have nowhere else to live, they have to move to a camp where they are provided basic needs. The government provides them with the most basic needs, such as food, shelter, and clothing. Sometimes these resources are not enough for everybody, and they have to share. This might be a problem for many families, which are not used to the scarcity of resources. If there are infections, for example, diarrhea, and there is no immediate treatment due to a lack of medicine, many people might lose their lives due to the disease.

Works Cited

Giri, Bishnu Rath, et al. "Effect of the 2015 earthquake on pediatric inpatient pattern at a tertiary care hospital in Nepal." BMC pediatrics 18.1 (2018): 28.

Schwind, Jessica S., et al. "Earthquake exposures and mental health outcomes in children and adolescents from Phulpingdanda village, Nepal: a cross-sectional study." Child and adolescent psychiatry and mental health 12.1 (2018): 54.