Smoke billows from Grenfell Tower. Victoria Jones/PA Wire/PA Images. All rights reserved. Anyone following the tragic events surrounding the Grenfell Tower fire on 14 June will have been struck by the calls for justice made by the survivors as well as by many other groups in society. Justice may seem an unlikely value to invoke in such circumstances – especially in a western democracy like the United Kingdom – where a reasonable degree of social equality is assumed.
Fire has a distinctive profile among hazards in that it is a great destroyer of property but rarely proves fatal even in the highly flammable slums and informal settlements of the developing world. The Grenfell Tower fire is unusual in that the death toll is high. In fact, over two weeks after the event, the death toll appears still undetermined or at least unannounced.
Over 95% of deaths and burn injuries are in low-and-middle-income countries where they mainly affect the very poorest in society – and such fires rarely make international news.
