Medical ConcernsIndex | Time Under Chaos | Concerning Amber | Medical Concerns Medical Concerns in Amber Medieval medicine and lifestyles leave much to be desired. This has caused rampant illness and injury throughout the city’s vast population. Under Oberon’s rule, the poorer sections of the city were frequently ravaged by plague and disease. Minor injuries, such as a broken bone or laceration, could leave a person crippled or dead from infection or lack of medical attention. Under Mandor's Edict, this poor access to medical facilities changed. Hospitals and infirmaries were built in every Ward to service the rich and poor alike. Although the finest medical facilities still remain exclusive to the nobility, even slums like the Rookery offer their citizens marginal health care. Asylums were constructed to treat and contain the mentally ill and deficient. Chaosian missionaries known as the Serpent Sisters frequently wander the streets offering healing, both physical and spiritual. Finally, large granaries and stockpiles of foodstuffs and supplies have been constructed throughout the city to ease hardships during states of emergency, times of war and siege, or periods of famine. These advances have vastly improved the general public’s health, almost matching early-20th century levels. (From The Hendrake Guide to Amber) That Amber had a health care problem prior to the Occupation is a big lie. While it is repeated often, it is not one which I will allow to become believed as a fact. It is true that, during Eric and Corwin’s administration, health within the city did suffer. There was were two serious outbreaks of influenza, but Amber’s trained doctors and nurses dealt with the problem in hospitals. Yes, hospitals. Doctors. Nurses. Their absence from Amber is a direct consequence of Mandor’s over-enthusiastic secret police. When one’s peers are captured and tortured and questioned about their loyalty, when doctors are preferentially targeted in the conquest, when medical personnel are forced at sword point to treat minor Chaosian injuries while Amber’s defenders lie outside in the streets dying… that Amber might have a shortage of trained medical staff should come as no surprise. As for plagues, Chaos brought a wide selection of them into Amber, and this was exacerbated by the destruction of the septic system. That the common people of Amber have more broken bones should also come as no surprise when the brutality of Chaosian Law, Chaosian police, and Chaosian Recreation are considered. To claim credit for ‘improving’ the health care system of Amber is like spitting in a man’s eye, then demanding he thank you for offering him a soiled handkerchief. And as for claims that health care in Amber has reached a high level, this may be true for the wealthy stooges of the occupiers, but common folk who may or may not have clear loyalties often find it harder to secure competent care. When the consequences of someone answering the wrong question the wrong way are disappearance, many never seek care for simple problems which subsequently become more serious. Certainly, this cuts down on the workload of the Chaosian-approved hospital staff, but it isn’t really what one expects when one is told the health care system has been made ‘more efficient.’ (From the writings of Johann Payne) |
