Is Killer Storm Still Taking a Toll?
Pastor Dale Morgan
Jun 2, 4:22 PM EDT
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Is Killer Storm Still Taking a Toll?*
By MARY FOSTER
Associated Press Writer
NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- The bodies are no longer being dragged from houses
and buildings toppled by Hurricane Katrina, but nearly two years later
many in the medical community think the storm is still killing.
Storm survivors are dying from the effects of both psychological and
physical stress, from the dust and mold still in dwellings to financial
problems to fear of crime, health experts and officials say.
"There is no doubt in my mind that Katrina is still killing our
residents," Orleans Parish coroner Dr. Frank Minyard said this week.
"People with pre-existing conditions that are made worse by the stress
of living here after the storm. Old people who are just giving up.
People who are killing themselves because they feel they can't go on,"
Minyard said.
Some say an in-depth federal analysis is needed, despite a new state
report that found no significant increase in deaths in the New Orleans
area from January 2006 through June 2006. The state Department of Health
and Hospitals is still compiling figures for the last six months of 2006.
Dr. Raoult Ratard, the state epidemiologist, said "the only slight
increase" in deaths was in the first three months of 2006 in Orleans Parish.
But New Orleans medical officials say that jump, from 11.3 per 1,000
deaths to 14.3 per 1,000, - a leap of more than 25 percent - was
anything but slight. Moreover, the report doesn't take into account
evacuees who died while away from the city and were returned for burial.
"Our death rate was already high, that's huge," said Dr. Kevin Stephens
Sr., director of the New Orleans Health Department.
Some New Orleans doctors questioned the accuracy of the population
figures used to determine the death rate, saying they might have been
too high. DHH secretary Dr. Fred Cerise said he was comfortable with the
population data, which he said came from the Census Bureau and the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The city was abandoned after Katrina struck Aug. 29, 2005, and many
people did not begin returning until mid-2006.
The official death tolls in New Orleans stands at about 1,100. State
health officials said deaths have not been listed as Katrina-related
since the end of 2005, except for bodies found under storm wreckage. But
Minyard said he believes the hurricane is still behind many deaths.
Dr. Ronald Kessler, professor of health care policy at Harvard Medical
School and head of a group that has monitored 3,000 exiled Katrina
survivors, said reconstructing an individual's mental and physical state
before death might help in determining exact causes of death.
"There are high rates of mental health problems among the survivors and
previous research has found that mental disorders are predictors of
earlier death rates," Kessler said. "So putting the two together in New
Orleans is not surprising."
Local mental health professionals say they are encountering more people
with psychological problems.
"We're seeing triple the number of people with mental health problems as
we were before Katrina," said Leah Hedrick, social worker at Ochsner
Hospital. "Depression, suicidal, anxiety, abuse of drugs and alcohol,
and along with that comes a lot more physical problems."
Many storm-damaged hospitals are not operating fully, and that could
help explain why other health facilities are seeing more patients.
Another possible sign that there are more deaths are paid death notices
in The Times-Picayune. Before Katrina, the newspaper usually printed
about a page daily. Now, three and four pages are not uncommon.
Stephens analyzed the death-notice pattern before and after the storm
and said he believes it confirms more local people are dying.
His study will be published this month in the Journal of Disaster
Medicine and Public Health Preparedness, the American Medical
Association's new publication on disaster management.
Many church congregations scattered after Katrina, and their bulletins
that carried death notices may not be publishing.
But Stephens discounted that as a possible explanation for why the
newspaper is receiving more death notices. Before Katrina, he said, it
was routine to place death notices in both the newspaper and outlets
such as church newsletters.
Minyard believes the medical community's different observations reach
the same conclusion, and one day will be proven correct.
"Years from now when they talk about post-traumatic stress, New Orleans
after Katrina will be the poster child," he said.