Why should young people care about health-care issues here and around the world?
We ought to know what might be on the horizon for the selfish reason that it might help us to avoid outbreaks or at least prepare for them. On a more idealistic or altruistic note, human beings ought to care about each other. Knowing what’s happening on the other side of the world may also motivate us to help people who are less fortunate than we are. The Gates Foundation, for example, is doing a tremendous amount of work to provide vaccines and find cures for diseases that are major killers in developing countries. What can we do to educate and protect ourselves? Governments can try to make vaccines, as our government is trying to do now in case bird flu becomes more contagious. For diseases such as West Nile virus that are spread by mosquitoes, governments can spray to get rid of the insects. Rich countries can pitch in to help poor ones, as they did during the Marburg outbreak. People in areas with diseases caused by mosquitoes or other biting insects can wear repellent and be aware
