The skin and the catastrophes

The disastrous events in New York and Washington of 11 September 2001 have changed the world as we know it. We can hardly find the words to express our feelings for the victims of the catastrophe, and convey our sympathy to their families. The terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001, and the anthrax emergency that spread all over the USA in the following weeks have clearly and dramatically demonstrated that terrorism can now cause a number of victims in forms and extent which were inconceivable in the past. The word catastrophe, from the Greek katastrophè, literally means involvement. In the Oxford dictionary, the item reads ‘a sudden event that causes great suffering or damage; disaster’. In the Italian Devoto-Oli dictionary, the definition is ‘mournful result or event, tragic conclusion, destruction, calamity, markedly severe disaster striking a community or else event interrupting the continuity and the causal order of the physical laws, which can be scientifically analysed’. Nowadays the word catastrophe takes a very different meaning. Numerous and varied are the possible forms of catastrophes that can be observed and all of them, according to the intensity, the duration and the relevance of the phenomenon, have an effect on human skin. The catastrophic events can be grouped in natural events, such as earthquakes, seaquakes, whirlwinds, hurricanes and floods, volcanic eruptions, avalanches, noxious gas release, and events caused by the human intervention, such as war, genocide, mass deportation, refugee camps, bombings, mines, torture, terrorist attacks, biological warfare, poverty, inconsiderate exploitation and impoverishment of entire geographical areas. The most common catastrophes are the post traumatic war disorders, the mines, the earthquakes, the poverty, poisoning, biological warfare and the torture: a voiceless disaster.