By Sosamma Samuel-Burnett
Founder/President, G.L.O.B.A.L. Justice
I am not an epidemiologist. I am not a medical expert of any kind. And, I don’t work in the health or medical field. So, I will not attempt to address the coronavirus COVID-19 from a health and medical perspective. But, as an advocate who has been engaged for more than 30 years on issues of public concern, including public health, I share the following thoughts for those who may want an advocacy perspective on this broader public concern. From that perspective, I find the coronavirus COVID-19 to be an interesting study in terms of public health and process, precaution and panic. The outbreak itself and the response from the media, government, and community have been both alarming and curious.
What is alarming is that this outbreak is of a new and previously unknown coronavirus. Coronaviruses can have various levels of severity from a cold to other types of illness. Though this new coronavirus was quickly identified as COVID -19, it also quickly became a public health concern. On January 30, 2020 the World Health Organization (WHO) declared it a medical emergency, and by March 12, 2020, the WHO declared it a pandemic. The WHO defines pandemic as worldwide spread of a new disease or virus. With COVID-19 now reaching more than 100 countries in just a few weeks, this new virus has legitimately been named a pandemic. At present, the COVID-19 has made at least 121,000 people ill and caused the deaths of more than 4,300 people. By contrast to other pandemic strains of viruses and contagious diseases such as the H1N1 or AIDs, these COVID-19 numbers are not as large as we might think, but what makes COVID-19 significant is that this virus is not only new but is making its impact in a relatively short time. Consider, for example, the situation in Italy and how quickly it spiraled downward. Also, the virus may or may not have yet peaked and may or may not have a long duration, so we have yet to know the full impact this outbreak could have. But as severe as it is in its spread, its severity as an illness is still not at the level of many other viruses and contagious diseases we have previously experienced and is not likely to be on that scale once it has peaked.
What’s curious though is the panicked response to this virus and its spread as contrasted to previous public health issues. Although the world has experienced other pandemics in recent history, this current outbreak is causing a global response that is quite distinct and disproportional. In 2009, H1N1 reached more than 1.6 million people with 284,500 deaths in 214 countries. The HIV/AIDs pandemic has continued on a massive scale in many regions. Recent statistics (dated 2018) note that about 37.9 million people are living with HIV. HIV also has caused 770,000 deaths. By these numbers, these earlier illnesses are more severe and serious pandemics than COVID-19 thus far. But despite their severity and although they also had responses around the world, these other pandemics did not stir the public like COVID-19. The current coronavirus has prompted a constant media and social media frenzy, triggered people to clear grocery and drug store shelves and hoard toilet paper and hand sanitizer, rescheduled or altogether stopped travel and events, make the stock market and investment portfolios tumble, and cause businesses to not only shut down but also some to go out of business altogether.
Perhaps that first part of the above sentence may be an explanation for the rest of that sentence. It may be that this current pandemic has had a near irrational level of panic because of the nearly irrational level of panic generated by media and social media. Since media and social media were not such significant factors in previous pandemics, they certainly can be one explanation for the current panicked response. But there may be a few more reasons worth discussing as follows.
We are living in an era that has these characteristics: 1) information is readily available but not always accurate, 2) information spreads quickly through media and more so through social media without verification, 3) significant political, economic, and social divides impact that information, 4) increasing globalization affects community response, and 5) increasing secularization affects personal response.
When we have information so readily available but not always accurate, it positions individuals to sort information and make their own conclusions. Those conclusions usually are not in a vacuum, but are based on personal perspectives supported by the sources they seek for information. In scanning through social media, there is a barrage of articles from many sources that provide a range of perspectives on the same issues. Thus, what we read as “facts” is often affected by where we choose to read it from and how. In many instances, we are reinforcing a personal bias or perspective with an article that seems to relate to our own sensibilities rather than a set of actual facts that are intended to inform regardless of our personal perspective. This situation can cause us to become very strong in our views while not always being very informed on what is actually the situation. So if our view tends toward panic, then the information we seek make us panic.
Media and social media can be useful sources to disseminate information quickly and widely. But since both media and especially social media are rarely vetted, the information does not provide clarity but instead generates emotion. There is a distinct emotional response that people have from the many images and posts that target segments of the community. For example, when the recent bush fires enveloped parts of Australia - the intensity of the images would make anyone believe that the entire country of Australia was in flames. The reality was that the whole continent was not in flames but a segment was. The fact that it is a segment does not take away from the importance of the event. But the idea that it is happening in the entirety of Australia creates a disproportionately higher emotional response. Social media and media coverage give us a much more intense look and so quickly that we are overwhelmed by it. Similarly, the onslaught of information about COVID-19 and the related images in various regions has made it also overwhelming. These media references then place it on a scale even larger than its actual scale, and very few viewers and followers are interested in knowing the actual. Few check the veracity of the information or its source. The information that creates an emotional response spreads quickly, thus influencing the community but not necessarily informing them. What is actually true often takes more time to gather and becomes almost irrelevant by the time it’s delivered. Much of the public attention is focused on the salient rather than on the important and accurate, especially on social media.
In addition, most media and social media sources have a political, economic, or social narrative that relates to their followers. That narrative translates the information based on certain political, economic, or social perspectives. Those who follow news that is politically left or right leaning are then not just getting information but also a certain narrative about what is happening and why. As people grasp their information from a media or social media narrative, they use the lens of that narrative to view the information and its significance. With political, social, and economic disparities and divisions, we have different understandings of even the same event or information and a high degree of distrust of another’s perspective. Most people don’t realize their distinct understanding based on a narrative, but we do all seem to see the divisions among us. Thus what we think we should do in response to the COVID-19 has varied as much as our varied political, economic, and social perspectives.
Globalization also has an influence on information. While we have become more interconnected in communications and commerce globally, we have not necessarily increased our understanding and interrelationships. How we see and view other parts of the world has an impact on how we view issues related to them, and they us. If we see a health or other epidemic happening in another country, we then start to feel a certain degree of concern for our own and/or an aversion for the other whether we realize it or not. Bias can sometimes be triggered by crisis. That also results in a closing of our society. Certainly when there is an outbreak of any kind, we need to take precautions, but we also could potentially block certain people or groups just because of fears about them whether or not we need to have such fears. Consider how few people are currently visiting Chinatown in San Francisco, for example, as a result of the COVID-19 fears.
In addition, as our communities and individuals become more secular, the idea of death and dying become more difficult. Without a spiritual reference for death and after-life, the biggest fear most people have is of dying. And when we receive such quick, unverified, and emotionally charged information, we also run the risk of heightened anxiety. People are feeling at risk, and that has caused fear, which in turn has caused reactions that seem less community oriented and more “every person for themselves.” People behave as if they are in a personal survival situation rather than facing a community crisis. This personal fear creates frenzy rather than an effective response to crisis.
While these characteristics in our society can breed a distrust, dislike, misinformation, and fear, what we need in the context of community crisis is clarity and direction. If we consider the COVID-19 pandemic a global community crisis, we need that clarity and direction even more so. My husband, who is a former Air Force pilot, often shared a phrase “you need to go slow to go fast.” Like flying a jet, crisis response requires a clear and methodical approach that allows us to respond effectively and quickly. Frenzy does not allow us to respond fast. Frenzy creates chaos that prevents clarity and actually impedes quick and effective responses.
Addressing COVID-19 as a pandemic, a global community crisis, we need to recognize these aspects of responding to this crisis effectively:
Identifying what, where, and how this virus was initiated and spread will help address the source and the approach to addressing the virus -- without clear information about this, we will have unclear and fearful responses that may either exaggerate or underestimate the actual needs and impact.
Creating a holistic public health and public policy response can help contain the virus, put the virus in context, and provide appropriate precautions based on scale and severity -- panicked responses based on a lack of understanding of scale and severity can be problematic for containment and response.
Allowing professionals and caregivers to position themselves to provide service to those in need. Those that will have to provide direct help also need direct support – and that support includes times, space, and resources -- when a community panics and buys up supplies (medical or personal), they may be impeding the ability of those who need to be part of the response from being able to effectively provide that response.
While these aspects of crisis response may take some time and may have challenges and even casualties during the response, a higher likelihood of success at containing, treating, and eliminating the risks of a pandemic comes from a methodical approach.
But containment of a virus is not the same as shutting down and debilitating our economy or political system. We certainly need to be aware of and take precautions, and we may not be able to do “business as usual” depending on the severity of the pandemic. But the idea is to have clear, rational thought on what makes sense in the immediate and longer term for the community rather than buckling our economy.
During this current pandemic, many institutions are closing for periods of time based on official, direct, or extra precaution. But it is not likely that the spread of COVID-19 requires a full political, economic, and social shutdown, any more than when we faced H1NI or HIV/AIDs. In fact, much the opposite may be the case. While business and activities may not be able to function in quite the same way during a pandemic, they still do need to function at a fairly high level. Why? Because addressing a pandemic requires resources for effective response. When we have political, economic, and social strength, we can generate the necessary resources – financial, human, and capital -- that may be necessary to fight the pandemic. Recession-initiating responses are counterproductive at a time when we need more, not less, to handle a pandemic.
The “every person for themselves” mentality is not useful in any type of crisis, let alone a public health crisis. We need to recognize the idea of scale and community response. Not every “crisis” or “pandemic” is on the same level or scale nor requires the same community response. Our responses must correspond to the situation. Panicking before we have a clear idea of what we face is not helpful to us individually or collectively. We should still watch the news, but we should not be enflamed by it. We should take precautions, but we need to continue living life. Our focus needs to be on strength in our community members, not in rolls of toilet paper.
The views and opinions expressed are those of the author(s) and do not imply endorsement by G.L.O.B.A.L. Justice. We are a faith-based, nonpartisan organization that seeks to extend the conversation about justice with a posture of dignity and respect.
