Practical Lessons Inwards Assessing Exotic Risks
I am having a few days of surfing lessons inward Bali on the mode habitation from a line concern trip. Its genuinely quite productive because I larn dorsum from 2 hours of lessons pretty closed to wrecked at 9.30 AM too eat. Then it is move for a bit, receive got a massage, move for a chip more, exit too live on a tourist, eat, move too sleep. I receive got taken to calling my room at the surf camp "the office" which horrifies the other guests (mostly younger European - particularly High German speaking backpackers).
Yesterday even too thus was unproductive. I rode a motor-scooter to Tanah Lot - a kitsch bunch of markets too an unusual coastal Hindu Temple. Now riding a motor-scooter inward Bali is non hazard gratuitous - indeed it is exhilarating amongst risk. However I idea I could reasonably listing all the risks.
I could not.
I rode past times a horse-drawn cart too the Equus caballus lent over too chip my shoulder.
Lesson 1: Its the risks that y'all can't run into that larn you. No hazard assessment is consummate without leaving infinite for what Donald Rumsfeld called the "unknown unknowns".
Anyway a quick perusal of the meshing raises my alarm. Bali was rabies gratuitous until 2008 when what was in all likelihood a unmarried rabid Canis familiaris came from Java. Bali beingness Hindu has dogs roaming around - symbols of goodness luck. They would non live on tolerated similar that inward most of Moslem Indonesia. There receive got been good over 100 deaths from rabies inward the past times few years inward Bali. H5N1 tourist lately died subsequently beingness bitten past times a monkey.
H5N1 farther perusal of the meshing suggests that it is possible to larn rabies from horses - indeed several cases receive got been confirmed inward Canada. Horses it seems are curious creatures too receive got been known to walk upward to strange-acting foxes leaving them vulnerable.
After some advice from some regular Bali goers I air current upward at the Bali Clinic inward Seminyak (a suburb of the tourist-and-flesh haunt of Kuta). This hospital is run past times a mix of Western too local trained doctors too the triage procedure sends infectious illness cases to i of the local doctors trained at Sriwijaya University inward South Sumatra. Now I know zip close that schoolhouse too picayune close South Sumatra other than that it is a good known Petri-dish of infectious tropical diseases (and some real goodness surfing). My gauge is that the average Dr. coming out of a academy inward Sumatra knows to a greater extent than close infectious tropical diseases than all but a handful of Harvard graduates.
So amongst some discomfort I conclude I am inward the correct hands.
The Dr. sends me home. He is aware that rabies is transmitted past times horses sometimes (but rarely) inward North America. He is also aware that bats are a vector inward some parts of the world. But to his cognition at that spot has never been a representative of rabies inward Republic of Indonesia from whatsoever beast other than a dog, a truthful cat or a monkey. He does even too thus construct clean out the injure too gives me the expected superficial iodine treatment.
The Dr. is almost sure right. Indeed I would pose the adventure of him beingness correct at over 99.99 percent.
But if he is incorrect I die.
This is a hazard I abhor taking. Every slice of my beingness hates taking this risk. In fiscal markets if y'all convey a hazard no affair how seemingly pocket-sized where an effect is full failure if y'all are incorrect too y'all are taking it at the advice of a so-called practiced y'all are probable to blow up.
Partly that is because fiscal experts be to brand medical experts aspect good. And it is because fiscal experts are conflicted inward a mode that medical experts are not. Indeed it is frequently because most fiscal experts are genuinely merely salesmen selling y'all the risks that their employers create non desire to take.
Finally it is also because fiscal risks are distributed too thus abnormally too inward fiscal markets y'all convey them repeatedly - day-in-day out. Where I alone got bitten past times a Equus caballus once. And things y'all create repeatedly volition larn y'all inward the terminate - but things y'all create alone i time in all likelihood volition non if the risk-level is depression enough. If y'all move into the habit of taking repeated wipe-out hazard inward fiscal markets y'all volition eventually live on got. I gauge if I got into the habit of beingness bitten past times foreign animals inward Bali I would eventually live on got too.
But hither I am, lying inward the "office" inward Bali taking exactly a hazard that I hope my clients I volition never take: the hazard of blow-up on the assurance of an "expert".
Maybe this is the hypochondria of exotic risks. I am flight habitation amongst Garuda Airlines - too some volition enjoin me that is an unacceptable hazard too. They are at i time quoted every bit an airline amongst a "much improved" security record. Whatever. It is a plane. I am inward the hands of "experts" too I create it all the time.
John
Yesterday even too thus was unproductive. I rode a motor-scooter to Tanah Lot - a kitsch bunch of markets too an unusual coastal Hindu Temple. Now riding a motor-scooter inward Bali is non hazard gratuitous - indeed it is exhilarating amongst risk. However I idea I could reasonably listing all the risks.
I could not.
I rode past times a horse-drawn cart too the Equus caballus lent over too chip my shoulder.
Lesson 1: Its the risks that y'all can't run into that larn you. No hazard assessment is consummate without leaving infinite for what Donald Rumsfeld called the "unknown unknowns".
Anyway a quick perusal of the meshing raises my alarm. Bali was rabies gratuitous until 2008 when what was in all likelihood a unmarried rabid Canis familiaris came from Java. Bali beingness Hindu has dogs roaming around - symbols of goodness luck. They would non live on tolerated similar that inward most of Moslem Indonesia. There receive got been good over 100 deaths from rabies inward the past times few years inward Bali. H5N1 tourist lately died subsequently beingness bitten past times a monkey.
H5N1 farther perusal of the meshing suggests that it is possible to larn rabies from horses - indeed several cases receive got been confirmed inward Canada. Horses it seems are curious creatures too receive got been known to walk upward to strange-acting foxes leaving them vulnerable.
After some advice from some regular Bali goers I air current upward at the Bali Clinic inward Seminyak (a suburb of the tourist-and-flesh haunt of Kuta). This hospital is run past times a mix of Western too local trained doctors too the triage procedure sends infectious illness cases to i of the local doctors trained at Sriwijaya University inward South Sumatra. Now I know zip close that schoolhouse too picayune close South Sumatra other than that it is a good known Petri-dish of infectious tropical diseases (and some real goodness surfing). My gauge is that the average Dr. coming out of a academy inward Sumatra knows to a greater extent than close infectious tropical diseases than all but a handful of Harvard graduates.
So amongst some discomfort I conclude I am inward the correct hands.
The Dr. sends me home. He is aware that rabies is transmitted past times horses sometimes (but rarely) inward North America. He is also aware that bats are a vector inward some parts of the world. But to his cognition at that spot has never been a representative of rabies inward Republic of Indonesia from whatsoever beast other than a dog, a truthful cat or a monkey. He does even too thus construct clean out the injure too gives me the expected superficial iodine treatment.
The Dr. is almost sure right. Indeed I would pose the adventure of him beingness correct at over 99.99 percent.
But if he is incorrect I die.
This is a hazard I abhor taking. Every slice of my beingness hates taking this risk. In fiscal markets if y'all convey a hazard no affair how seemingly pocket-sized where an effect is full failure if y'all are incorrect too y'all are taking it at the advice of a so-called practiced y'all are probable to blow up.
Partly that is because fiscal experts be to brand medical experts aspect good. And it is because fiscal experts are conflicted inward a mode that medical experts are not. Indeed it is frequently because most fiscal experts are genuinely merely salesmen selling y'all the risks that their employers create non desire to take.
Finally it is also because fiscal risks are distributed too thus abnormally too inward fiscal markets y'all convey them repeatedly - day-in-day out. Where I alone got bitten past times a Equus caballus once. And things y'all create repeatedly volition larn y'all inward the terminate - but things y'all create alone i time in all likelihood volition non if the risk-level is depression enough. If y'all move into the habit of taking repeated wipe-out hazard inward fiscal markets y'all volition eventually live on got. I gauge if I got into the habit of beingness bitten past times foreign animals inward Bali I would eventually live on got too.
But hither I am, lying inward the "office" inward Bali taking exactly a hazard that I hope my clients I volition never take: the hazard of blow-up on the assurance of an "expert".
Maybe this is the hypochondria of exotic risks. I am flight habitation amongst Garuda Airlines - too some volition enjoin me that is an unacceptable hazard too. They are at i time quoted every bit an airline amongst a "much improved" security record. Whatever. It is a plane. I am inward the hands of "experts" too I create it all the time.
John
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