Are not biblical plagues but they seem that way. Contaminated water, forest fires and erupting volcanoes, seismic faults in the middle of the city, resurgence of diseases As the measles, a subway that fails daily. And as a background violence and, hand in hand with her, corruption.
What happens with him contaminated water in the Mexico Cityparticularly in the Benito Juárez mayor's office, is a sum of negligence (either political vendettas). For at least three weeks, neighbors have been complaining that the water smelled like gasolinewhich was contaminated and dirty, that some people They had diseases when drinking it or bathing.
The response until last weekend from SECMEX, the institution in charge of water distribution in Mexico City, was to ignore the complaints and residents were told to clean their water tanks. It was not until Saturday, when the neighbors began blockades and demonstrations, that serious studies began to be carried out.
But we don't even know how much they are: the head of government Marti Batres did not address the issue until Monday, when recognized that he water was contaminated with some kind of fuel, and said that the source of contamination was neither the Cutzamala nor the wells that supply the city. The next day it was reported that a well had been discovered that was contaminated and was taken over by security forces.
But at the time of writing these lines we still do not know what the source of contamination is, what product it contaminates, the neighbors continue with the demonstrations because they do not have answers that go beyond generalities and it is not seen that the problem has a short-term solution .
One of the unanswered questions is how the fuels reached the water supply sources. And the ghost of the clandestine seizures, of that huachicol that was said to have been eradicated and that is more prosperous than ever, reappears, because it is assumed that the
main pipelines for petroleum products would have to be controlled. It has been said that the source of contamination could be two companies that work in the area with these types of products, but the truth is that until there is certainty as to what the contaminant is, it will be difficult to establish responsibilities. But I insist, due to the type of contamination, the geographical extent and its persistence over time, it seems to be much more the leak from a clandestine intake or a pipeline than the negligence of a company.
All this has an additional problem. No investment has been made in the city's water infrastructure since the Calderón government. There have been no major works, no work has been done to reduce the loss of drinking water through the pipelines themselves, which, according to some specialists, exceeds more than a third of what reaches the city.
That is an enormous challenge that implies radically changing the model of water generation and distribution and sooner rather than later we will have to work with private initiative (which the local constitution prohibits) to be able to move forward in that direction. It is not only that the sources can, as is happening, decrease or even run out, it is about
invest in technology to avoid leaks and such high losses, but also to make efficient and modernize a service that today is only managed in its shortcomings. With an aggravating factor, as we saw in the case of Benito Juárez: not even the complaints that plague him are addressed in time.
Perhaps it is no coincidence that in the same area where these fuel pipeline leaks are occurring, contaminating the water system, microseisms are occurring as a result of a fault that crosses from the Alvaro Obregón mayor's office to Benito Juárez. The well indicated is in Alvaro Obregón, the contaminated water is perceived in Benito Juárez. The fault that causes the microseisms is at low depth in that same area. Can these earthquakes affect pipelines and systems? It is not at all unreasonable, because furthermore, although the authorities continue to call them microseisms (as if to reduce the perception of risk) they are still telluric movements that have to affect the infrastructure of the area. We don't have an answer for that either.
Meanwhile there are forest fires in the rural area of the city and its surroundings that poison the air and the exhalations of Popo don't help either.
And to make matters worse, diseases that had been practically eradicated such as measles reappear, about which the Ministry of Health issued a health alert this week. The paradox is that this secretariat and the unpresentable former undersecretary López Gatell are responsible for the failure to carry out the vaccination campaigns that the Mexican state had carried out for decades, regardless of who governed. Mr. López Gatell does not believe in vaccines.
It is true that there has been progress in security in the city, but recently the number of murders has increased again, some of them frankly worrying, such as that of a woman attacked in front of Bellas Artes and the murder of a TEPJF worker in Xochimilco. which forced the provision of security for magistrates and officials of that institution.
They are not biblical plagues, they are political.
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