Viruses run rampant across Havana as water, power fails
HAVANA, Sept 30 - Cuban housewife Yuamilka Hechavarria was asleep last Tuesday when water rushed into the cistern of the crumbling tenement where she lives in old Havana.
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she → run → Havana
She jumped from bed, scrambling in the darkness of a blackout to top off a bucketful before the tap went dry.
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tap → jump → bucketful
It was the first time her building had seen water in two months.
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building → see → months
This scenario plays out in neighborhoods across Cuba's capital of Havana daily, where power outages exacerbated by a US oil blockade have crippled the already crumbling infrastructure that supplies water to the city's nearly two million people.
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that → play → people
Many regularly go without running water for days or weeks.
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Many → go → days
Hygiene is among the first casualties of the situation, explains Hechavarria, a healthcare worker, who for weeks had been forced to buy water from street vendors or scavenge it from nearby broken pipes.
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who → explain → pipes
Diarrhea has run rampant throughout her building, she says, as tenants struggle to keep even tiny apartments clean.
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tenants → run → apartments
“There's no one in this building who hasn't gotten sick," said Hechavarria, adding that she too was recovering from a recent bout of fever and diarrhea.
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she → be → fever
Officials in both the United States and Cuba have begun to sound the alarm.
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Officials → begin → alarm
Health authorities in Cuba have warned in recent days of the spread of viruses, including a strain of viral hepatitis, as power and water increasingly fail.
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power → warn → hepatitis
And a US health alert earlier this month warned travelers and residents of a "significant increase in diarrheal illness across Cuba, associated with the continuing degradation of the water and energy infrastructure.
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alert → warn → infrastructure
Since the US imposed a fuel blockade in January, blackouts across Havana now regularly surpass 24 hours, hampering refrigeration and further crippling antiquated water infrastructure of which nearly 90% depends on electric-powered pumps, according to Cuba's National Institute of Hydraulic Resources.
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% → impose → Resources
Around 3.5 million people, or just under half the island's population, now suffer from water shortages, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has said.
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Office → suffer → Affairs
NO ESCAPE FROM NEW REALITY
Hechavarria's home — a poorly ventilated, one-room hovel she shares with her 7-year-old son and husband — would make any doctor cringe, despite her best efforts to maintain order and hygiene.
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doctor → ventilate → order
Thirty families live in similarly cramped quarters in the same small two-story building.
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families → live → building
A recent power surge damaged her refrigerator, leaving her without a way to conserve food.
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surge → damage → food
She uses it instead to store medicine, beans, and rice.
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She → use → medicine
Plates litter her kitchen counter and sink.
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Plates → litter → counter
She reuses dirty dish water to clean the floor or flush the toilet.
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She → reuse → toilet
She uses soap only when she can afford it.
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she → use → it
Her husband, meanwhile, is responsible for pushing a homemade handcart fitted with two large barrels at least once weekly to a pipe that juts from the wall of a local school.
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that → push → school
If classes are in session and there is power, the school fires an electric pump that allows water to flow from the pipe into an alleyway.
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water → be → alleyway
On a recent weekday morning, neighbor Andres Jimenez, a 76-year-old retired metal worker, had arrived at the spot just as the power went out.
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power → arrive → spot
Only a trickle of water remained.
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trickle → remain → water
"If there's no power, they don't run the pump," he said.
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he → be → pump
Concerns over hygiene would have to wait, he added.
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he → have → hygiene
Nurse Maria Elena Parlado, who lives nearby and works in a clinic in the neighborhood, said there is no escaping the new reality.
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who → live → reality
"Look around us," she said, pointing to a roadside trash heap beside a small stream of sewage running along the sidewalk.
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she → look → sidewalk
Even the clinic where she treats local residents for fast-spreading viral outbreaks is without water, she said.
"Between one patient and another I should be washing my hands, but sometimes I can't." REUTERS
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I → treat → hands
The Aporia
