BY SOLOMON G. TENAYE
When children put the life of their father at risk forcing the hardworking farmer to sit idle concerned for him and to make him lead the so called ‘modern life’, what is tragic is that their decision has brought unanticipated consequence. Misquoting modern life for dropping their father’s movement to zero, they must have learnt after too late that their choice of caring parents and making him idle, is far from reality.
Immediately after abandoning his age-long profession- farming, the old man came down with the bulk of disease, later on sticking to his death bed suffering from stroke. This is a real story of former colleague’s father.
In recent days, I have been frequenting to one of the Public Hospitals, in the capital. I came by with this former colleague of mine, a well-informed citizen with rafts of life and working experience. I met him while he was caring his bedridden father who was in his mid-80’s. Given his age one might assume that it may not be strange for people of his time of life to be sick-abed for various illnesses. What is amazing, however is how it all happened fast and how the disease conquered the strong old man to become too fragile in shorter period of time. After having the usual chit-chat and about the condition of his father, I learnt that the old man is suffering from a stroke.
Stroke, as sources indicate, also called: CVA, cerebrovascular accident, happens when blood flow is occluded in a part of the brain. The lack of oxygen damages the brain cells that can have potentially disabling effects on the patient. It can, thus, be understood that stroke is the disruption of oxygenated blood to the brain. According to JOHNS HOPKINS MEDICINE strokes can be classified into two main categories: Ischemic strokes and Hemorrhagic stroke. Ischemic strokes are strokes caused by blockage of an artery (or, in rare instances, a vein). About 87 percent of all strokes are ischemic. The other type of stroke, Hemorrhagic strokes are caused by bleeding. About 13 percent of all strokes are hemorrhagic. According to stroke association, the disease is the No. 5 cause of death and a leading cause of disability in the United States. I shall leave discussing about the disease to the professionals.
In Ethiopia, stroke is also becoming one of the deadliest and most dangerous diseases. A study made on characteristics and outcomes of stroke at Tikur Anbessa (Black Lion) Teaching Hospital in 2005 by Zenebe, G., Alemayehu, M., & Asmera, J. indicate that stroke is an important cause of hospital morbidity and mortality in Ethiopia. The study added that hemorrhagic stroke was the most common cause of stroke accounting for 57 percent of all patients and 59.2 percent among those who had a computed tomography (CT or CAT) scan.
According to WHO data published in 2017, stroke deaths in Ethiopia reached 6.23 percent of total deaths. In addition, the age-adjusted death rate of stroke in the country is 89.82 per 100,000 of the population. Considering the time gap between now and the time of the study, it is logical to estimate that the case would get worse.
Coming back to the case at hand, the health of my friend’s father got deteriorated following the children’s miscalculation to force their father abandon farming and put him practically under house arrest. ‘How come, can you explain?”, I bombarded him with questions. “We [the children] wanted him to quit farming and lead a better life by staying home rather than busying himself farming and chasing cattle in the fields; we do not want him to look shabby rather remain clear all the time and eat clean food,” he replied rather deplorably. It gives pride to children in our culture to care parents at their latter age in response to their invaluable sacrifices and responsibilities for raising children all the way through.
My friend’s father had always been a very strong farmer- farming, milking, herding and taking care of his cattle and crops on his farmland until his children- ironically enlightened with the concept of modern life- put his survival in jeopardy. They thought they freed and gave their father a relief from his age-long friend and profession- farming. While their concern for their father’s safety and better living was natural to do, how they did it was somehow rather a disaster especially considering the outcome.
Evidence suggests that regular physical activity reduces the incidence and the mortality associated with stroke. According to sources, the relative risk reduction appears to be somewhere between 20 and 30 percent. Some studies, though not all, report a trend for higher risk reduction with higher intensity physical activity. The importance of the relationship is becoming clearer: physical inactivity has been implicated by the INTERSTROKE study as one of the 5 key risk factors which account for more than 80 percent of the global burden of stroke. What the children missed here, as I reckon, is that their father was in a very good health condition as his body was in a continuous movement while he was a farmer.
The modern life entails physical activity to be enlisted under our daily hustle and bustle for our lifestyle and our current table is too much of the non-organic food content. In Ethiopia, where farmers are still ploughing traditionally with no mechanisation aid, they still can be considered to be in continuous physical activities. Studies show that exercise and physical activity have an increasing evidence base in the primary and secondary prevention of stroke and in stroke rehabilitation.
Absent to these physical activities, especially for a man like my colleague’s father whose entire life was closely linked to farming would expose him to several diseases. The U.S. National Library of Medicine stated that physical inactivity is a significant risk factor for stroke. And this is what happened to that poor old man and his family.
Wishing his father’s quick recovery, I left the hospital in confusion- what is wrong in our lifestyle that easily and in no time expose us to such a disease, was it not good to take care of parents by doing what my colleague and his siblings did; and what are the solutions on table in our health systems and many other unanswered questions were in my mind. But it taught me one thing- that uninformed decision on leaving our way of life would result in such a fatal.
The Ethiopian Herald February 20/2021
