The Swine Flu Crisis:
The Government Is Preparing for the Worst While Hoping for the Best ? It Needs to Tell the Public to Do the Same Thing!
by Peter M. Sandman
<!-- End top-matter --> New viruses move fast. What I'm writing on April 29 may be hopelessly antiquated by the time you read it.
By the time you read this:
As a risk communication professional, I have been watching the U.S. government walk a tightrope between over-reassurance and over-alarm about a swine flu outbreak that could easily turn out devastating, minor (except in Mexico), or anywhere in between.
I will focus my comments here on the U.S. government, because I have been watching it most closely. Most governments in places with fewer cases, or none so far, have been much more reassuring in their public communications than the U.S. government has been. The U.S. hasn?t faced the temptation to issue false reassurances that the authorities will keep the pandemic from ?our? shores ? a temptation to which dozens of governments have succumbed. I doubt any government is doing better swine flu risk communication than the U.S. government. So let?s talk about what the U.S. government is doing, especially what I believe it is doing wrong.
If you want to know more about how the rest of the world?s governments ? and some U.S. state governments ? have been mishandling the crisis, check out a posting on the Flu Wiki Forum with the wonderful title ?Ministers in Wonderland / Beyond Indefensible Over-reassurance.? ?Path Forward? (the poster) is the nom de flu of my wife and colleague Jody Lanard, currently working with <acronym title="World Health Organization">WHO</acronym> in Asia.
It is a long article and the rest can be found here
The Government Is Preparing for the Worst While Hoping for the Best ? It Needs to Tell the Public to Do the Same Thing!
by Peter M. Sandman
<!-- End top-matter --> New viruses move fast. What I'm writing on April 29 may be hopelessly antiquated by the time you read it.
By the time you read this:
- The outbreak of H1N1 ?swine flu? (or ?swine-origin flu,? as some are urging it be called) we?re all tracking may already have launched a worldwide catastrophe.
- It may have proved itself too mild (except at its start in Mexico) to cause serious health problems in significant numbers.
- It may be a lot worse than mild but still a lot milder than catastrophic.
- Its spread may have slowed or stopped instead of snowballing ? because we?re successfully isolating cases and inhibiting transmission, or because it doesn?t like the increasingly hot weather in the northern hemisphere, or for other reasons that scientists won?t figure out for months.
- It may still be hanging in the balance ? in which case public health experts will still be watching with bated breath, but the media and the public may well have moved on to something else, muttering about fear-mongering.
As a risk communication professional, I have been watching the U.S. government walk a tightrope between over-reassurance and over-alarm about a swine flu outbreak that could easily turn out devastating, minor (except in Mexico), or anywhere in between.
I will focus my comments here on the U.S. government, because I have been watching it most closely. Most governments in places with fewer cases, or none so far, have been much more reassuring in their public communications than the U.S. government has been. The U.S. hasn?t faced the temptation to issue false reassurances that the authorities will keep the pandemic from ?our? shores ? a temptation to which dozens of governments have succumbed. I doubt any government is doing better swine flu risk communication than the U.S. government. So let?s talk about what the U.S. government is doing, especially what I believe it is doing wrong.
If you want to know more about how the rest of the world?s governments ? and some U.S. state governments ? have been mishandling the crisis, check out a posting on the Flu Wiki Forum with the wonderful title ?Ministers in Wonderland / Beyond Indefensible Over-reassurance.? ?Path Forward? (the poster) is the nom de flu of my wife and colleague Jody Lanard, currently working with <acronym title="World Health Organization">WHO</acronym> in Asia.
It is a long article and the rest can be found here
