Flu flim-flam and democracy
Madeline Drexler has an interesting piece in the Los Angeles Times, reprinted in Common Dreams, [Dr. Bush's Flu Flim-Flam], discussing the centrality of trust for successful coping with a potential pandemic, such as that posed by avian flu. She points out that government lies and missteps in dealing with situations such as the Iraq war and Hurricane Katrina may come back to haunt us in the form of popular distrust and lack of cooperation with public health efforts to prepare for and combat this possible catastrophic threat.
I would go further than Drexler and argue that a potential pandemic of uncertain likelihood poses even greater challenges. Massive resources must be mustered in advance to deal with a threat that may never occur. If the resources are made available and the pandemic doesn’t hit, cynicism may make mustering resources against the next threat all the more difficult. On the other hand, fears of being seen as crying wolf can interfere with devoting the resources needed now, with few overt indicators of the degree of danger we face.
The only solution to this dilemma I can see is real democracy, wherein people are actively involved in discussing, understanding, and preparing for the threat. With information and active participation in decision-making, people are less likely to react in ways that make preparing for this and future threats more difficult. Unfortunately, democracy of that nature is virtually absent from America today.
Add comment January 8th, 2006