Viral Sovereignty and the Political Economy of Pandemics: What Explains How Countries Deal With Outbreaks? by Sophal Ear

Author:Sophal Ear [Ear, Sophal]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Public Policy, Science & Technology Policy, National, Social Services & Welfare, Comparative Politics, Social Science, Political Science, Political Process, Reference, American Government, Disease & Health Issues, Economic Policy, General
ISBN: 9781000487183
Google: RptIEAAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 59140211
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2021-11-28T00:00:00+00:00

Ebola: conflicts between infection control practices and prevailing cultural beliefs

Cultural practices surrounding funerals contributed to the disease’s spread. A single funeral in Liberia, for instance, became a super spreader event as the source of 52 additional cases of Ebola. In many indigenous West African religious customs, it is common for the body of the deceased to be washed before burial. This practice is often performed by family members with their bare hands.44 It is also common practice for mourners to touch the body of the deceased or to kiss the body farewell during funeral rites. Corpses are highly infectious, as Ebola in its advanced stages cause symptoms such as vomiting and diarrhea that saturate the body with the virus. As a result, West African funeral practices served to exacerbate the extent of disease’s spread.45 At a funeral in Sierra Leone, an herbalist contracted the virus while treating infected Guinean patients; more than a dozen mourners at her funeral became infected with Ebola, causing an outbreak in Sierra Leone. To make matters worse, some mourners traveled back to their homes in Guinea and Liberia and spread the disease in both countries.46

Both Liberian and international health authorities made efforts to reduce the virus’s transmission during funeral rites. The Liberian Red Cross deployed members to disinfect bodies and burial sites with bleach while wearing protective equipment; meanwhile, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) donated body bags to Liberian villages to reduce locals’ contact with infected corpses. Unfortunately, these countermeasures were not as effective as they could have been: there was great distrust between Ebola-affected communities and health workers.47 Communities’ distrust of health care authorities was rooted in the weakened public health care system of affected states. Such distrust was further inflamed by cultural misunderstandings between the locals and international health workers. Dr. Pierre Rollin, an outbreak specialist at the CDC, stated, “Traditions that contributed to Ebola’s spread, including funerals where mourners came into contact with corpses, were not fully recognized or confronted.”48 Moreover, rumors such as the belief that Ebola treatment centers (ETCs) killed people for organ trade caused Ebola-infected individuals in Guinea to avoid ETCs and hide in the forest instead.49

Deftly navigating indigenous customs or politics is not the expertise of medical professionals, whose priority is to provide aid to people in need as quickly as possible. Villagers’ behavior and attitudes toward health care workers ranged from hiding unwell family members from them and conducting funerals in secret50 to becoming overtly hostile: some believed that the health care workers were bringing the disease to their village, so they blocked the road with tree trunks or drove them away with stones.51 Villagers in Guinea ran away from Red Cross trucks and cried out “Ebola, Ebola!” upon spotting Westerners in their village. When the medical unit team from Doctors Without Borders traveled to the Guinean village of Wabengou, the village chief said, “We don’t accept their presence at all. They are the transporters of the virus in these communities.”52

People in Guinea’s rural villages appeared to have more faith in indigenous healers.

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