Uncovering Mexico
Jeremy Schwartz is the Mexico correspondent for Cox Newspapers. He is based in Mexico City.What's on this page?
All the entries posted on November 02, 2007.
Categories
Commenting is open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. M-F
More recent entries
- The PRI rises again
- Japanese man lives in Mexico City airport
- Love motels feeling the pinch
- Mexican scientist tapped for Obama's team
- Newspaper attacked with grenades
- More entries...
| S | M | T | W | T | F | S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | ||||
| 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 |
| 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 |
| 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 |
| 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 |
| More archives... | ||||||
Home > Uncovering Mexico > Archives > 2007 > November > 02
Friday, November 2, 2007
Day of the Dead … and a struggle to survive in Tabasco
Most of Mexico is celebrating today, taking part in festive Day of the Dead observances from the Zocalo in Mexico City to cemeteries in Oaxaca.
But in the state of Tabasco, hundreds of thousands of people have just one thing on their mind: survival.
Much of the low-lying, tropical state, at the edge of the Yucatan Peninsula, finds itself under some level of water from flooded rivers. The state got a quick respite from torrential rain yesterday, but more rains are on the horizon.
Mexico is rallying around the people of Tabasco, much as the U.S. did after Katrina devastated New Orleans. Canned food drives are popping up all over Mexico City and President Felipe Calderon has called on Mexicans to give as much as they can to their fellow Tabasquenos.
As bad as the situation is in Tabasco, it could get worse in coming days. Not only is more rain forecast, but water and food shortages, looting and the possibility of diseases like cholera have been reported. The government has been desperately trying to rescue people from rooftops and shelters are saturated. The governor announced that the floods have affected a million people and some 300,000 are in need of rescue.
Comparisons with Katrina are hard to avoid. The El Universal daily writes this morning in an editorial that New Orleans and Tabasco both suffered from a lack of planning despite warnings that local levies and dams weren’t sufficient to hold back massive rainfall. Voices are also beginning to question how the floods caught the state so off-guard and why mass evacuations weren’t ordered earlier.
Unlike Katrina however, the death toll in Tabasco — so far at least — has been amazingly low. One resident reportedly died of a heart attack during a rescue, but other than that reports of drowning have yet to emerge. But hundreds of residents have been reported missing.