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A peek down into a multiple urban pathology
Panama News Briefs

Multiple urban maladies here

So will somebody complain that the government isn't doing its job when this trash stops up this sewer line and gross smelly wastewater flows out into the street?

What we see here, in an uncovered hole in a sidewalk along Avenida Nacional between Santa Fe and Arnulfo Arias Madrid hospitals, is a multple urban pathology:

1. 'Oh, it's a hole in the ground --- that's a good place to throw trash....' Despite a few brave attempts to challenge it, littering is an entrenched part of Panamanian culture and this is an example of it. Some sociologists think that the problem largely stems from the country's transformation from a mostly rural to a mostly urban society over the past half-century, with the acquisition of city living habits lagging well behind.

2. Notice the throw-away beverage containers. Those were innovations brought to the Panamanian market by the local subsidiaries of US corporations, which have since been acquired by foreign interests. Meanwhile in the USA, a number of states have imposed mandatory deposit laws that have proven effective at taking beverage containers out of the roadside litter mix.

3. Much of the rest of the refuse is platic bags and packaging materials. In Germany and to a lesser extent in some of the other European countries, there are laws restricting the use of plastic for packaging and that has reduced both littering and the amount of scarce landfill space needed for the disposal of plastic solid wastes. Panama City is also beginning to run out of landfill space, as a number of other communities around the country already have.

4. There is the medical pathology of dengue fever. When it rains these pieces of discarded metal and plastic accumulate tiny pools of water, which are the favorite breeding spots for the Aedes aegypti mosquito that's the vector of this occasionally fatal flu-like disease.

5. There is also the medical factor of treating people who are injured when they step into uncapped utility service holes like this one, and those who are injured in car crashed caused by such open holes in the roadways.

6. There is the cost of cleaning out sewers and storm drains that get clogged with litter, a constant expense for government entities that are already running on tight budgets.

7. And why is this sewer hole uncapped? Because some petty criminal stole the cap and sold it for scrap metal.

8. And why is there anyone who would buy parts of our urban infrastructure for scrap metal? Because you almost never hear of anybody being arrested for purchasing or receiving such stolen property, despite the immense proportions of the problem. Is it because the buyers also pay bribes to avoid arrest and prosecution, or just that our cops, prosecutors and courts are too lazy to do their jobs and protect us from the sewer cap theft industry?

9. Stealing sewer caps surely isn't a fun or lucrative way to make a living, and when the things are taken from the roads, it's downright dangerous to do. So why would so many people do it? Think in terms of drug addiction, chronic unemployment, and a society that brands whole large categories of people as unemployable throwaways because they can't compete by rules that the elites impose, and who are thus left to fend for themselves in some often incredible ways.

10. And why would anyone vote for politicians who can't do such a simple thing as keep the utility holes covered? That's a far more complicated set of issues, which also add up to an urban pathology.

Photo by Eric Jackson

Torrijos defends "security law" proposals
Colombian kidnap industry discussed by high-profile victim's sister

High court to hear challenge to ACP's multi-billion dollar "reserve fund"

Terrorist whom Mireya pardoned gets bail in the USA
US media, a few gringos here are fascinated by grisly murder case

A peek down into a multiple urban pathology
Panama News Briefs