Amazon wildfires are tomorrow’s breathtaker

This article was exclusively written for The European Sting by Ms. Yılmaz Can Boru, a 2nd year medical student at Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University, in Turkey. She is affiliated to the International Federation of Medical Students Associations (IFMSA), cordial partner of The Sting. The opinions expressed in this piece belong strictly to the writer and do not necessarily reflect IFMSA’s view on the topic, nor The European Sting’s one.

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Everything starts with a sparkle! We always use this term when we encourage people to take action according to the vision we have as a federation. But this time I wanted to use this term to point a trigger warning of the wildfire in amazon rainforests, the lungs of the earth. Yes, we see how a small sparkle turns into a disaster in the sense of the number of oxygen sources we lost. While I am writing these words, who knows how many acres of forests turned into ashes. We need to consider the earth is not a phoenix, so it can’t reborn from the ashes. You may say it happens every day on numerous territories. Yes, it is! But this time, it happens in the lungs of the earth in a very serious way. Let’s have short look, do we aware of the danger waits for us. From January 1 to July 30, 2019, there were 25,619 wildfires compared with 37,591 wildfires in the same period in 2018. About 3.2 million acres were burned in the 2019 period, compared with 4.8 million acres in 2018. The number of acres was burned increasing year by year. To get specified on Amazon Rainforest Fire; we also need to consider the damage of the harmony of nature. Numerous animals became homeless, insects and plants have destroyed with all of the harmonies of wildlife. This is the truth which directly affects our life and health as human beings. Because that creatures we ignore has a big role to make harmony at earth-life. The wildfire also affects the air and land pollution especially and oxygen saturation of the air. That means it violates the 4th generation of human rights as well as the right to live in a healthy environment. These poisoned gases in the smoke cause chronic damages at the aspiratory system of the human body. The damage shows itself as bronchitis, asthma as well as cancer caused by air pollution and poisoned gases. Medical Science is getting developed day by day in the sense of new treatment methods, medical equipment, and technology. But we need to consider, threats of human health are also increasing as fast as medical development. Every day we wake up with a new disaster which can affect global health. This one is just one of them but bigger. If we don’t say STOP, this kind of disasters going to get bigger. Saying STOP! to this wildfires doesn’t get enough, we need to learn how to prevent, how to act before, during and after the disaster. Meanwhile, we need to be aware and don’t let the fire takes our breath. Searching, spreading and taking action are the keys to prevention just like this article as a sparkle.  Let it start with this little sparkle! Sources *https://www.iii.org/fact-statistic/facts-statistics-wildfires *https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/IF10244.pdf *http://eschooltoday.com/natural-disasters/wildfires/what-can-start-a-wildfire.html *https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/wildfire *https://www.qualityhealth.com/asthma-articles/asthma-fireplaces About the author I am Yılmaz Can Boru, 2nd year medical student at Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University, in Turkey. A passionate human rights advocate and ethusiastic learner of global health. Touching the lives of people who needed to help and courage always been a passion for me. I believe that every human being is unique and there is so much that every human being can learn from each other. No matter where inspiration comes from, maybe it’s as huge as a mountain or maybe it’s as small as an ant. The important thing is believing ourselves and dare to change the world with start with changing one person.