Dams and Disease This page intentionally left blank. Dams and Disease Eoclogical design and health impacts of large dams, canals and irrigation systems William Jobin London and New York First published 1999 by E & FN Spon 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 E & FN Spon is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005. To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk. © 1999 William Jobin All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. The publisher makes no representation, express or implied, with regard to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and cannot accept any legal responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions that may be made. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Jobin, William R. Ecological design and health impacts of large dams, canals and irrigation systems/William Jobin. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-419-22360-6 1. Hydraulic engineering—Environmental aspects. 2. Hydraulic engineering—Health aspects. I. Title. TD195.H93J63 1999 627–dc21 98–30320 CIP ISBN 0-203-47718-9 Master e-book ISBN ISBN 0-419-22360-6 (Print Edition) Contents Preface vii Acknowledgements ix 1 PART I Health opportunities 1 Introduction 3 2 General ecological aspects of dams and canals 12 3 Predicting health impacts in the Tropics 28 4 Water-associated diseases 60 5 Health opportunities through ecological design 74 85 PART II The Americas 6 North America 88 7 Caribbean region 95 8 South America 170 179 PART III West Africa 9 Morocco 181 10 Senegal River 194 11 Niger River 248 12 Volta River 271 286 PART IV The River Nile and the Horn of Africa 13 River Nile 289 14 Eritrea 365 15 Somalia 387 415 PART V Southern Africa 16 Zambezi River 417 17 Sabi River Basin in Zimbabwe 425 433 PART VI Middle East and Asia 18 Iran 435 19 Pakistan 444 20 Asia 459 472 PART VII Final summary 21 Final synthesis and specific guidelines 474 22 Appendix: ecology of major diseases associated with water in the Tropics 509 Glossary of chemical names 568 Index 569 Preface Water is a key health and environmental resource. Unfortunately in the Tropics, water resources have been developed recently in ways which cause disease and other social and environmental problems. After engineers have carelessly designed and constructed many of these water projects, other people responsible for the health, social and environmental sectors have had to implement remedial measures, at great expense. This irrational procedure cannot be allowed to continue while malaria, AIDS, and other newly emerging tropical diseases are on the rampage in the Tropics, and where the environment is under intense assault from exploding populations. I propose in this book that water resources be deliberately developed in ways that promote health and social well-being, without detriment to the environment. This approach will avoid the negative impacts of large dams, canals and irrigation systems which now afflict us in the second half of the 20th century. It is not a new approach; it was at the heart of many large water projects in the past, especially those which have endured. My proposal calls for a restructuring of the UN family of organizations which deal with water and health. It is made in the spirit of opening new approaches for the UN system, which is in deep trouble. A classical example of the healthy version of water resource development is shown by the multiple dams of the Tennessee Valley Authority in the USA, constructed at a time when malaria was a major scourge of the southern USA. By careful pre-project investigations and by coordinated design and operation of their 30 reservoirs, malaria was eradicated from this valley before the biocide DDT* and the drug chloroquine* were even available. Malaria has not returned to the valley in over half a century. Thoughtful environmental manipulation of the reservoirs has allowed them to continue to produce hydroelectric power, to prevent floods, and to serve as major sources of water recreation to the present day. Compare this with recent dams and irrigation projects which the World * A glossary of chemical names is provided on page 573. Proprietary and generic names are used throughout the book. Bank is supporting in the Senegal River Basin of West Africa, destroying the communities they were built to save, through ignorant design and greedy operation. In the temperate zones of our globe, environmental and social impact analyses focus on equitable compensation for land-taking, and on minimizing environmental damages. In the tropical zones, however, the issue is more often human survival. Many of the resettled communities from large tropical dams have simply disappeared, due to the trauma of losing their homelands. Children and elderly people die most quickly, others face a lingering and uncertain threat of poverty and malnutrition. Despite the best attempts of its environmental staff, and despite admirable programmes and policies, perhaps the biggest failure in this field is the World Bank. Starting with preliminary guidelines in the early 1980s, the World Bank has now developed an admirable set of social and environmental directives for development projects, especially those related to water resources. Nonetheless, recent World Bank water projects have come to represent the worst in unhealthy and socially destructive enterprises. There must be a better way. With the incentive of the re-occurring disasters in the last half-century, I propose a new way in this book. My proposal is based on experience in Africa and the Americas while investigating and trying to improve health conditions on new and existing irrigation and hydroelectric projects. This proposal is radical, and assumes a great deal of effort will be extended by international groups. I hope that the tragic dramas documented in the following pages will motivate you, the reader, to seriously consider my proposal for the World Health Organization and the World Bank. We have to find a better way. WILLIAM JOBIN Dolores, Colorado July 1998 Acknowledgements This book has been supported by several editors with E & FN Spon. I am grateful to Nick Clarke, Tim Robinson, Tony Moore, Richard Whitby and Michael Doggwiler for their patience and guidance during these last two years. I am especially grateful to Chuck Hollingworth for the creativity, care, insight and good humour he exhibited in correcting errors and improving the manuscript, although any remaining mistakes are my own. If there is real value in this book for improving the health of people in the Tropics, it is due to the guidance and inspiration I received from my Iranian friends in the World Health Organization, sometimes known affectionately as the Persian Mafia—Hushang Rafatjah, Rashed Bahar, Fereydoun Arfaa, the late A.H.Taba, and the late N.Ansari. Despite the rumours, M.Reza Shah Pahlevi was not a member of the Mafia. For the real story about bilharzia in Egypt and Africa, I have always depended on K.Y.Chu and Ralph Klumpp. Sometimes my family is amused that I see the world in terms of rivers and river valleys. Once I made a Christmas videotape that dwelled for quite a time on the Dolores River near my home in Colorado. My daughters laughed. But they shouldn’t be surprised; rivers have been the setting for some of my most important life experiences. As a child I played with my brothers and buddies every summer on the banks of Salt Creek, a turbid tributary of the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers. Those were glorious days of youth, often passed in falling off our makeshift rafts, getting stuck in the muddy shallows, exploring the river. As a teenager I was baptized by immersion in holy waters of northern Illinois, only to re-experience real baptism and spiritual rebirth along the banks of the Charles River in Massachusetts when I started to live in the cold, cruel world, by myself. Both Salt Creek and the Charles River were horribly polluted rivers in my youth. Their condition caused me to doubt the wisdom of my teachers and professors at MIT. If they were so smart, why do they live and teach along such filthy rivers? An experience which radically changed my life occurred in the spring of 1964 when I walked across the lazily meandering Selma River with Dr Martin Luther King, Jr and 10000 other people. Although we knew Death would come that day, we did not fear it as we crossed over that small, lazy river in the cottonlands of Alabama. Three of us were killed, but I will never forget the powerful sensation that God was with us—and them— as we made the crossing. He took away our fear and lifted us across that river. My first introduction to the joys of field research on tropical diseases in Puerto Rico came from the late Fred Ferguson, and from Henry Negron-Aponte, Bill Rowan and Ernesto Ruiz-Tiben. However, they taught me so much about bilharzia that I never dared to go swimming and splashing in the creeks and lakes of that beautiful tropical island. Then, in Khartoum during 1978 I wrestled with the Ground of All Being over my future, along the banks of the Blue Nile. He was calling me to risk my family, my career,