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Historian says Taiwan's sanitation must improve

A historian specializing in medical history says one of the keys to overcoming future epidemics is to strive for a better developed citizenry in the country.

The spread of SARS revealed two deep-rooted problems in this country. The first is a nearsighted government that has failed to establish a substantial sanitation network. The second is a public, including medical practitioners and patients, that need more education on sanitation and health matters, said Chuang Yung-ming (莊永明), a professor at Taipei Medical University (台北醫學大學) and author of Medical History of Taiwan (台灣醫療史).

Chuang argued that the country had achieved little in sanitation development over the past decades.

The history professor referred to the period between 1945 -- when the KMT government took over the governing of Taiwan from Japan -- and the present.

"Medical education, influenced by the purpose of making a fortune from medical practice, influenced the neglect of research into and training staff for the non-profit sanitation system," he argued.

Witnessing certain medical personnel's reluctance to join the anti-SARS lineup and an irrational panic among the public during the SARS epidemic, Chuang said that the citizenry of the country should be better educated on health matters.

"Most nationals must improve their basic sanitation education, including their capacity for self-discipline, if they are going to help the government cope with any new diseases," he said.

Chen Chun-kai (陳君愷), a historian at Fu Jen University, concurred with Chuang.

"An improved sanitation network and better health education are the keys to success in future confrontations with epidemics transmitted through frequent international travel," said Chen, who completed his master's and doctoral studies on Taiwan's epidemiological history.

He warned that more diseases will continue to emerge from areas in Africa, Indo-China and China.

"New epidemics will propagate in these regions because of poor sanitation there. The diseases can seriously hit the civilized world since they are new and unknown to mankind" Chen said.

Perceiving the spread of SARS as a result of intensified international exchanges, Chen warned that "emergent epidemics will seriously hit the country if the government does not become more prepared for outbreaks and the public remains careless about the dangers posed by their irrational response to spreading epidemics."

Chen said that the slow progress of local sanitation development was due to the former KMT government's negligence in this regard.

"During Japanese colonization, the authorities imposed strict measures guarding against epidemic outbreaks. Japanese administrators punished violators of the prevention and control instructions in a non-negotiable manner, and strict surveillance not only curbed most pestilences on the island but also marked a new era in Taiwan's sanitation development," Chen said.

He said the pragmatically-driven Japanese government not only helped the Taiwanese eradicate two major pestilences, the plague and cholera, but also started the preliminary establishment of a Taiwan-wide sanitation network.

The KMT regimes, however, lacked similar determination to advance public sanitatiory development, Chen said.
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