The total title of this distressing article by Jeff Ernst (for The Guardian’s column “Seascape: the state of our oceans”) is “Damaged by the bends: the lethal toll on Honduras’s Indigenous lobster divers.” Ernst writes that, “pushed by poverty to work within the harmful fishing business with insufficient tools, Miskito too usually find yourself paralyzed or lifeless.” [Note that Honduras has Caribbean Sea coastlines to the north and the Pacific Ocean to the south. See map below.]
On the primary avenue of Puerto Lempira, a person sits outdoors a restaurant in a wood, hand-propelled cart and waves to a different man ambling by in a cart of his personal. A block down, a person in a wheelchair is pushed by a younger girl previous a person on crutches. At a nook, a pair of males clutching canes lounge within the shade.
It could possibly be an outline of a retirement neighborhood. However the males are of all ages, and such scenes are frequent throughout the coast of Gracias a Dios, an Indigenous territory in north-east Honduras, the place many years of unsafe fishing practices have disabled hundreds who dive the Caribbean Sea to reap marine life.
In accordance with the Heart for Justice and Worldwide Regulation (Cejil), greater than 4,000 Indigenous Miskito divers have lately suffered disabling accidents as a consequence of decompression illness – the equal of roughly one in each 9 males above the age of 14 in the whole division. At the least 400 have died, and numerous others have been misplaced at sea.
The shortage of financial alternative right here in one of many nation’s poorest areas leaves many residents confronted with a dilemma – dive and assume the chance, or don’t and watch as your loved ones suffers in different methods.
“That’s why the daddy is disabled and the son is disabled,” stated Pablo Padilla, a board member of the Affiliation of Disabled Honduran Miskito Divers (AMHBLI) who himself suffers from restricted mobility, bladder and bowel dysfunction, power ache and weak point as a consequence of a diving accident. “I’ve 4 members of the family who’re disabled.”
Final month, after a ruling by the Inter-American Courtroom of Human Rights following a lawsuit filed on behalf of 42 divers, the Honduran authorities apologized to divers and their households for the violation of their human rights, dedicated to indemnify them and pledged to make systemic adjustments aimed toward stopping future accidents.
“I’ve no revenue, no job, nothing,” stated Willy Gómez, one of many divers named within the lawsuit, whose accidents left him unable to work and help his household. His case exemplifies one of many merciless ironies for divers within the area – they’re pushed to the work, regardless of realizing the risks, out of determined have to help their households, however then many are left so gravely injured that their financial scenario finally ends up worse than earlier than.
And making good on the federal government’s pledge of systemic change is more likely to be simpler stated than performed. “Every thing [the government] stated is true and sounded good, however typically they are saying issues however don’t comply with by,” stated Gilberto Palma, a former diver who attended the ceremony and was injured final 12 months whereas diving for lobster, leaving him with restricted mobility and power.
Decompression illness, also called the bends, happens when divers ascend too shortly, leading to a speedy lower in water strain that produces bubbles within the bloodstream which may wreak havoc on the nervous system and important organs in addition to inflicting many different much less seen illnesses.
If a affected person is shortly taken to a hyperbaric, or decompression, chamber, which exposes the affected person to excessive strain and pure oxygen, the results may be diminished and even reversed. A number of divers who spoke with the Guardian stated they’d arrived to the chamber in Puerto Lempira utterly paralyzed, however had regained partial mobility due to the therapy. Others arrive a lot too late. [. . .]
The issue has its roots within the Nineteen Seventies when industrial fishing arrived to the area, first harvesting lobster, then conch, then – over the previous decade – sea cucumbers, tubular invertebrates with leathery pores and skin which can be thought of a delicacy in elements of Asia.
Overfishing has led divers to hunt out marine life farther out to sea and in deeper waters, growing the prospect of damage.
“Every year you must go deeper to seek out the product, so extra divers die,” stated one fishing boat captain. “Boats lose divers like fishermen lose a rod.” [. . .]
For full article and images, see https://www.theguardian.com/surroundings/2023/could/02/honduras-lobster-divers-indigenous-miskito-bends