Global health. The current scenario and future perspectives

289 classified as disasters are increasing. While technological development has greatly contributed to human control over nature, in many cases it has been precisely these advances in technology that have not only caused disasters to occur but also made them more destructive and detrimental to a greater number of people. An eloquent example is the construction and development of megalopolises with a huge population (a phenomenon that renowned art historian Ernst Gombrich referred to as the main catastrophe of the 20 th century). There are qualitative differences between a disaster affecting a small rural community and one affecting Tokyo (with 30 million inhabitants), which impact factors such as severity, number of victims, geographical extent, collapse of health and emergency services, as well as damage both tangible and intangible. According to estimates by Swiss Re Institute, natural disasters that occurred in 2020 resulted in costs amounting to USD 83 billion, making it one of the most expensive years for industry since 197 0 52 . Thus, as pointed out by eminent American political scientist Patrick Deneen, “we have become accustomed to arguing that we must follow science on issues such as climate change while ignoring that our crisis is the result of a long chain of scientific-technical triumphs where following science meant progressing civilization.” Philosopher Michael Sandel seems to agree with this view. He harshly criticizes American elites for approaching challenges like climate change strictly from a technocratic perspective while evading the problems that technology itself has introduced, as well as its ethical and moral implications. In summary, our analysis can be approached from numerous angles and perspectives. However, given the limited length of our work, we have chosen to analyze five events: 1) Bhopal Disaster, 2) Seveso Disaster, 3) Kobe Earthquake, 4) Indian Ocean Earthquake and Tsunami and, finally, 5) Hurricane Mitch. All these cases started as local emergencies but soon surpassed the capacities of local authorities. This led to progressive disaster scenarios, catastrophes and sometimes cataclysms. Before going into our case studies, we need to briefly define each of these different scenarios to better understand the phenomena under study. An emergency is defined as a severe disruption or interruption of normal conditions in a human community. It is caused by a (current or imminent) event that requires immediate response from state institutions, local authorities and media (Maturana, 2011: 549). 52 See the following link: https://www.swissre.com/media/news-releases/nr-20201215-sigma-full-year- 2020- preliminary-natcat-loss-estimates.html.