You know the Internet meme: There’s a woman, head in hand, silently weeping, or James Van Der Beek, from his Dawson’s Creek days, on the edge of crying big elephant tears, with a caption that gives a minor daily annoyance and the words “First World Problems.”
You know the type of annoyances to which I am referring. Things like “I can’t hear the TV when I am eating potato chips,” or my personal favorite, “My diamond earrings keep scratching my iPhone.”
Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, the rest of the world doesn’t consider these problems. In remote parts of India, the local governments are dealing with issues like securing sanitary water resources, having enough teachers for children, and procuring medical supplies to test and treat for sickle cell disease (SCD), which is present in more than 13 percent of students in these areas.
In more than 30 regions of remote India, the towns and villages lack basic sanitation and healthcare supplies. In some villages, only a few teachers are contracted to teach the primary school aged children. At least one village does not even have a female teacher who stays overnight at the school’s dormitory facilities for the 150+ girls who attend.
Not to be overlooked, the prevalence of sickle cell disease among the people of these villages is staggering. By comparison, approximately 0.3 percent of Americans have the disease. Proper testing and treatment need to be a priority for these populations.
Sickle cell disease is an inherited disorder that causes red blood cells to be malformed.
Rather than the traditional indented disks, red blood cells look like crescents or sickles. This change in shape can get the cells caught up in veins, thereby preventing adequate blood flow and oxygenation to various organs.
