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Flood begins with rain but disasters start with us
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When the floodwaters swept through parts of Ghana on Monday, June 29, they carried away more than furniture and household belongings. They washed away years of hard work, children’s school books, market goods, and family savings and, tragically, claimed lives.
For the families that lost loved ones, no amount of assistance can replace the pain of the silence left behind by someone who got lost during the torrential rains.
For many other survivors, the ordeal did not end when the rains stopped, but rather will have the Herculean task of rebuilding their lives from almost nothing.
Mothers searched through debris for anything they could salvage. Children stood quietly beside damaged homes, unsure of when life would return to normal. Traders who lost their wares stared helplessly at soaked goods that represented their only source of income.
This is the situation whenever it rains continuously for hours, yet, once the waters recede, many of the behaviours that contribute to these disasters return.
Drains once cleared become clogged with plastic waste. Waterways are treated as dumping sites, while buildings continue to spring up on wetlands and natural drainage channels.
Effects on women, children
For many women, particularly market traders, farmers and owners of small businesses, the floods had erased years of hard work in a matter of hours.
Merchandise have been destroyed, equipment damaged, and incomes disappear overnight.
With many women working in the informal sector and having limited financial protection, recovery is often slow and difficult.
Beyond the economic losses, women frequently carry the added burden of caring for their families during and after disasters. They clean flood-damaged homes, care for children, older relatives and the sick, secure food and water under difficult circumstances, and help restore a sense of normalcy while coping with their own trauma.
Children are equally vulnerable. Floods disrupt their education by damaging schools and making roads impassable. Many children are displaced from their homes, exposing them to health risks, emotional distress and unsafe living conditions.
For children from already vulnerable households, a flood has deepened poverty and interrupted their development in ways that last long after the waters have receded.
Human activities
The scale of destruction witnessed during floods is often magnified by human behaviour.
Drains designed to carry storm water are clogged with plastic waste, discarded household items and other refuse.
Wetlands and natural waterways are encroached upon through unplanned development, leaving floodwaters with nowhere to go.
Although floods affect everyone in their path, women and children often suffer the greatest consequences.
Climate Change
Climate change has made rainfall more intense and unpredictable, but it is the actions of humans that often turn heavy rains into humanitarian disasters.
As the nation reflects on the devastation caused by the recent floods, one question demands urgent attention: How much of this destruction could have been prevented?
Climate change and increasingly intense rainfall are undeniable factors, the uncomfortable truth is that many of these disasters are worsened by human actions.
Choked drains, indiscriminate waste disposal and the encroachment on waterways continue to turn heavy rains into avoidable tragedies.
Climate change has undoubtedly increased the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, but it is only one part of the story.
UNICEF report
These concerns are reflected in UNICEF’s Children’s Climate Risk Report 2026, which warns that hundreds of millions of children worldwide face multiple climate hazards, including flooding.
According to the report, climate-related disasters threaten children’s health, education, nutrition and protection, with children in vulnerable communities facing the greatest risks.
The report also highlights how existing inequalities often compound the impact of climate emergencies on women and children.
Floodwaters contaminated by waste also increase the risk of outbreaks of cholera, typhoid, diarrhoea and malaria. Pregnant women, nursing mothers, young children, older persons and people living with disabilities are particularly susceptible to these health threats.
United Nations (UN) Women notes that women and children are often disproportionately affected by climate-related disasters because they are more likely to experience poverty, carry greater caregiving responsibilities and have fewer resources to recover from disasters.
When floods destroy livelihoods, existing inequalities become even more pronounced. The painful truth is that many of these losses are avoidable.
Way forward
No drainage system, regardless of how well designed, can function effectively if it is filled with refuse. No flood prevention programme can succeed if wetlands continue to be reclaimed for construction or if sanitation regulations are ignored.
Preventing floods is therefore not the responsibility of government alone. It requires a collective commitment from every citizen.
Proper waste disposal, regular community clean-up exercises, respect for planning regulations and the protection of waterways are simple but powerful actions that can save lives.
Government must equally strengthen waste management systems, enforce environmental and building regulations without compromise, invest in climate-resilient infrastructure and ensure that disaster preparedness and response strategies address the specific needs of women, children and other vulnerable groups.
The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction has repeatedly emphasised that reducing disaster risk is far less costly than responding to disasters after they occur.
Investing in prevention, strengthening institutions and promoting responsible environmental practices remain among the most effective ways of protecting lives and livelihoods.
The recent floods should serve as more than another headline. They should be a national wake-up call.
Climate change may be beyond the control of any one individual, but how we treat our environment is not. Every plastic bottle thrown into a drain, every illegal structure erected on a waterway and every act of indiscriminate dumping contributes to a cycle of destruction that claims lives and undermines national development.
If Ghana is to break that cycle, environmental responsibility must become a shared national value.
By Esinam Jemima Kuatsinu
The average modern Gold Coaster born and bred in Sikaman is an adventurous creature. Go to any part of the world and you’ll find Ghanaman diligently slugging it out either in the snow or in hot sweltering weather, earning a decent living.
Go to Guinea and see Ghanaman in the garb of a herbalist, curing the sick of various ailments. He makes the Guinean understand that not all diseases are caused by James Lucifer alias Jimmy Satan. On the contrary, most diseases are caused by kooko which can even attack the human nose and turn it upside down.
That kooko is also the cause of poverty and the internal bleeding of personal back-pocket economies. And that kooko can be cured using the chemistry underlying Sikaman herbal medicine which has been blessed by the gods of Larteh.
And before Ghanaman starts dispensing his herbal concoctions, he must attract the passing crowd with some Sıkaman-originated choreography, akin to a combination of adowa and agbadza, such that the dancer can easily dislocate a shoulder and start crying for his mother.
When the crowd is enough to form a quorum, Ghanaman must perform magic as a side-attraction, and proceed to sell his drugs. The drugs are genuinely made from potent herbs which the Pharmacy Board of Sikaman says it has no confidence in. Believe me, Ghanaian herbalists are practising in neighbouring countries like Guinea, Cote d’Ivoire, Sierra Leone and Benin, while we are discouraging them from practising in Sikaman.
Go to Las Palmas and see Ghanaman as a fisherman. He sails on Korean-owned boats and is forced to eat garlic and raw tuna for radiant health. The garlic is also supposed to protect him against witches. But sometimes, he is not good bedfellows with some Korean crew members, and once in a while a fight breaks out.
The typical Korean is a Kung Fu expert and before displaying a golden dragon data. He must first terrify Ghanaman with a Korean dance which consists of wild arms and leg throwing. But Ghanaman is usually not daunted. Why has he been eating cancer kenkey all years without developing cancer? It mean is a superhuman capable of countering Kun fu side-kicks to the ribs.
Anyhow Ghanaman’s most potent arsenal lies in his fists. If he is a southpaw, it mean left fist is probably insured and can cause damage. When Ghanaman lands a cassava blow and it lands on a Korean chest, it has the effect of a cruise missile. If there is no ceasefire a funeral cannot be ruled out.
Greenland
Go to Alaska and find Ghanaman there. Greenland, Iceland, Brazil, Argentina, Madagascar, everywhere and you’ll find him. He has become an international citizen and is generally lauded for his hardwork, sincerity and honesty.
However, some bad nuts are also condemned and despised.
The world and all its parts and corners are for the human race, and anyone can choose to live anywhere and earn a decent living so long as he doesn’t misconduct himself or become a social misfit and a law unto himself.
Sıkaman for instance accepts foreigners, and we are so liberal that people just come in through our borders and we welcome them with the best palmwine in town and goat light soup. Who cares about passports and visas? Our hospitality is, as it were legendary.
So we have Liberians, Nigerians, Sierra Leoneans, Togolese, Europeans, Americans, Scandinavians and Koreans in Sikaman. And some of them have misinterpreted our overzealous accommodation to mean “foolishness” and are misconducting themselves.
The newspapers carry stories of some unscrupulous Nigerians stealing, defrauding and collaborating with their Sikaman counterparts to rob people. You’ll find some good and law-abiding Liberians around but some other Liberians are in the business of fraud, robbery, money printing, money doubling, anything criminal.
Ghanaian hospitality can no longer be extended to such people. I do not think Ghanaians will be treated kindly either, when they misbehave anywhere in the world. Those who come from outside with the intention of bringing down their evil deeds and to practise them here professionally must be getting ready because Ghanaians are getting fed up with the menace.
These days, you’ll find strange people following you as soon as you emerge from a bank. If you are not careful, they’ll wrestle your briefcase from you and speed away in a waiting taxi.
Someone was just saying that many foreign criminals are flocking to Ghana because in their countries, they are enable to operate either because they are being looked for by the police for offences committed or fear instant justice at the hands of mobs. Ghanaians, it is said, are humanitarian in dealing with criminals.
Well, in some African countries, a thief who is being chased runs directly to the police station in his own interest and begs the officer at the counter to lock him up. Otherwise he’ll be lynched or be burnt to death. In Ghana, it is the opposite. The thieves run far away from the cop stations.
The criminals must reform and stay peacefully in Sikaman or quit. No court case!
This article was first published on Saturday September 5, 1998
The human condition is defined by two absolute, biological bookends: the commencement of complex cellular animation and its ultimate, irreversible cessation.
For centuries, medicine treated life and death as strictly separate states. Today, modern pathology and molecular biology reveal a more profound truth: the mechanisms that allow us to live are the exact same mechanisms that dictate how we die.
Understanding this relationship is no longer just a philosophical pursuit. It is a clinical necessity for managing public health in the 21st century.
Part I: How we live – The mechanics of animation
At its core, biological life is a continuous, high-stakes battle against entropy (the natural tendency of systems to degrade into disorder). To maintain form, consciousness, and function, the human body relies on three fundamental pillars:
1. Cellular respiration and energy production
Every second of human life is powered by the conversion of oxygen and glucose into Adenosine Triphosphate (ATP), the universal energy currency of our cells. This process occurs within the mitochondria.
Without a constant supply of ATP, the microscopic pumps that maintain electrical gradients across our cell membranes fail, causing cellular collapse within minutes.
2. Homeostasis: The balancing act
To survive, the internal environment of the body must remain incredibly stable, regardless of external chaos. This balancing act, known as homeostasis, regulates:
Blood pH: Strictly maintained between 7.35 and 7.45.
Core Temperature: Ideally kept around 37°C (98.6°F).
Electrolyte Balance: Precise ratios of sodium, potassium, and calcium that allow nerves to fire and muscles to contract.
3. The Autonomic Nervous System (ANS)
The ANS acts as the invisible conductor of life, split into two complementary branches:
Part II: How we die – The path of cessation
Death is rarely a singular event; it is a progressive biological cascade. Whether caused by old age, chronic illness, or sudden trauma, the final pathways of mortality generally follow a predictable trajectory.
1. The cellular horizon: Senescence and Apoptosis
Every time a human cell divides, the protective caps at the ends of its chromosomes-telomeres-shorten. Eventually, telomeres become so depleted that the cell can no longer divide safely. It enters senescence (a state of permanent arrest) or triggers apoptosis (programmed cell death). This gradual, systemic loss of cellular renewal is the underlying engine of aging.
2. The clinical cascade of somatic death
When the body can no longer maintain homeostasis, somatic death (the death of the organism as a whole) begins. This occurs in a distinct sequence:
1
Clinical Death
Zero to four minutes
The heart stops pumping blood, and respiration ceases. While breathing and circulation have ended, the body’s tissues still contain residual oxygen and cellular energy reserves. At this stage, resuscitation is often still possible.
2
Brain Death (Infarction)
Four to six minutes
Deprived of fresh oxygenated blood, the brain’s highly sensitive neurons begin to starve. Lacking ATP, the brain cells lose their electrical charge, swell, and begin to burst. Permanent, irreversible neurological damage occurs within minutes.
3
Biological Death
Hours to days
The organs fail entirely. Without central control or blood flow, individual cells throughout the body consume their final energy reserves. Enzymes that once aided digestion begin to break down the body’s own tissues from the inside out, a process known as autolysis.
Part III: The modern collision of life and death
In the modern era, the boundary between how we live and how we die has blurred. Historically, humanity died primarily from infectious diseases and acute trauma. Today, global mortality is dominated by non-communicable, chronic lifestyle diseases.
Modern Pathology: How we live (the cause) how we die (the result)
Cardiovascular disease, chronic stress, poor diet, and lack of sleep keep the sympathetic nervous system hyper-activated, damaging blood vessels .Occlusion of coronary arteries leads to myocardial infarction (heart attack) or ischemic stroke.
Metabolic syndrome over nutrition and physical inactivity overwhelm cellular mitochondria, leading to systemic insulin resistance. Multi-organ failure, chronic kidney disease, and severe vascular complications.
Neurodegenerative Disorders Chronic systemic inflammation and sleep deprivation prevent the brain from clearing metabolic waste. Gradual loss of synaptic connections, leading to dementia and the eventual loss of basic autonomic functions.
Conclusion: The unified theory of health
Ultimately, how we live directly shapes the path of how we die. The micro-choices of daily existence-how we manage emotional stress, the quality of our rest, our communal connections, and our nutrition-either preserve the integrity of our homeostatic systems or accelerate their decline.
True medical advancement is shifting away from merely extending the final, frail stages of biological death. Instead, the focus is turning toward optimising our living years-ensuring that the intricate, beautiful machinery of human animation runs smoothly until its natural, quiet conclusion.
By Robert Ekow Grimmond-Thompson
