The Troubled Public Sphere and Media Coverage of the 2003 Toronto SARS Outbreak

Drache, Daniel; Clifton, David A.

doi:10.1002/9781444305012.ch6

Cited by 9 publications

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“…Three health care workers died of SARS—the report on SARS by the Chinese‐Canadian National Council (CCNC) has emphasized that all three were members of Chinese or Filipino Canadian communities (Leung & Guan 2004). In the local media, the initial pattern of reporting during March and April 2003 was one critical of frontline health care workers, followed in May 2003 with much greater emphasis on the heroics of these frontline workers (Drache et al 2003).…”

Section: The Legal Consciousness Of Frontline Hospital Workersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rights and Quarantine During the SARS Global Health Crisis: Differentiated Legal Consciousness in Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Toronto

Jacobs

2007

Law Soc Rev

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Interventions in public health crises inevitably give rise to concerns about how the balance between rights concerns and community health security might be handled. During the SARS global health crisis, different jurisdictions struggled simultaneously with similar public health challenges posed by the previously unknown and deadly disease. Yet instead of a convergence of strategies, different jurisdictions responded with measures, especially with regard to the use of quarantine, that revealed a pattern of divergence about how to strike the balance between rights concerns and health security. The origins of this article stem from the realization that Toronto's use of quarantine was far more extensive than that of either Hong Kong or Shanghai, two jurisdictions with historically weak records regarding respect for fundamental rights and civil liberties. Perspectives on the balancing of individual rights and community health security are treated here as expressions of legal consciousness. Instead of assuming a uniform legal consciousness in Toronto, Shanghai, or Hong Kong, this article presents legal consciousness as varied among groups of individuals differently situated in the crisis. The promise of this differentiated approach to legal consciousness is that it facilitates both drawing contrasts between perspectives of differently situated groups within the same city and noting commonalities between similarly situated groups in other cities. Through an examination of three distinct perspectives on rights and quarantine in each cityFthose of senior public health officials, frontline hospital workers, and contacts of SARS patientsFthe competing legal meanings and understandings about the tensions between community health security and individual rights during the SARS crisis are identified in a way that enables us to better understand the pattern of different uses of quarantine.

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Section: The Legal Consciousness Of Frontline Hospital Workersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rights and Quarantine During the SARS Global Health Crisis: Differentiated Legal Consciousness in Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Toronto

Jacobs

2007

Law Soc Rev

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“…News reports of terrorism and natural disasters, however, sometimes have been faulted for inaccurate, incomplete, and sensational coverage that may contribute to public misunderstanding of risks [6-8]. Research suggests journalists are unprepared to cover terrorism and many types of natural disasters, in part because journalists lack sufficient expertise in science and medicine [9-11].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effective media communication of disasters: Pressing problems and recommendations

et al. 2007

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BackgroundPublic health officials and journalists play a crucial role in disseminating information regarding natural disasters, terrorism and other human-initiated disasters. However, research suggests that journalists are unprepared to cover terrorism and many types of natural disasters, in part because of lack sufficient expertise in science and medicine and training. The objective of this research was to identify solutions to problems facing journalists and public health public information officer (PIOs) of communicating with the public during natural and human-initiated disasters.MethodsTo assist in identifying the most pressing problems regarding media response to health-related risks such as terrorism and large-scale natural disasters, 26 expert advisors were convened, including leaders representing journalists and public information officers, state health officials, experts in terrorism and emergency preparedness, and experts in health, risk, and science communication. The advisory group participated in pre-arranged interviews and were asked to identify and review bioterrorism educational resources provided to journalist. All advisory group members were then invited to attend a day long meeting January 29, 2004 to review the findings and reach consensus.ResultsThe most pressing problems were found to be a lack of coordination between PIO's and journalists, lack of resources for appropriately evaluating information and disseminating it efficiently, and a difference in perception of PIO's and journalist towards each others role during emergency situations. The advisory board developed a list of 15 recommendations that may enhance communication plans betweens PIO's, journalist and the public. The solutions were meant to be feasible in terms of costs and practical in terms of the professional and organizational realities in which journalists and PIO's work.ConclusionIt is clear that PIO's and journalists play crucial roles in shaping public response to terrorism and other disasters. The findings from this formative research suggest that perspectives and organizational processes often limit effective communication between these groups; though practical solutions such as participation of journalists in drills, scenario exercises, sharing of informational resources, and raising awareness at professional trade meetings may enhance the timely dissemination of accurate and appropriate information.

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“…Images and stories of contagion portrayed in outbreak narratives elevate anxieties about faster modes of transportation in our globalized world, which provide easy avenues for pathogens to spread and infect mass populations (Shah, 2016;Wald, 2008). Drache and Clifton (2008) argue that we are living in a world of global cultural flow, "an intense movement of people, capital, ideas and information" (p. 119) where the chances of unintended health consequences have exponentially increased as pathogens have the ability to move throughout the world without restriction. Gerlach and Hamilton (2014) consider health scares to have "indeterminate potentiality" because they are ubiquitous and may emerge at any given moment.…”

Section: Health Scares and The Outbreak Narrativementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Further to this, Hooker (2008) states that other than the possibility of vast disease outbreak, health professionals worry about the increased saturation of fear-mongering and panic that outbreak narratives foster in popular discourse. Consequently, this leads to less reporting about the scientific facts of disease and more about framing the health scares through a moralized and sensationalized lens (Béland, 2011;Drache & Clifton, 2008). For example, Drache and Clifton (2008) argue that the local "saturation of news coverage" during the 2003 SARS outbreak in Toronto insisted that the city was unsafe to visit because the disease was out of control (p. 110).…”

Section: Health Scares and The Outbreak Narrativementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Consequently, this leads to less reporting about the scientific facts of disease and more about framing the health scares through a moralized and sensationalized lens (Béland, 2011;Drache & Clifton, 2008). For example, Drache and Clifton (2008) argue that the local "saturation of news coverage" during the 2003 SARS outbreak in Toronto insisted that the city was unsafe to visit because the disease was out of control (p. 110). The media exaggerated the danger of the SARS outbreak by unequivocally comparing it to Spanish influenza, a deadly virus that killed over 40 million people worldwide near the end of the First World War (Béland, 2011;Smith, 2006;Shah, 2016).…”

Section: Health Scares and The Outbreak Narrativementioning

confidence: 99%

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Forgive Me Child for I Have Sinned: Anti-Vaxxer Folk Devil Mothers and Narratives of Redemption

Pucci¹

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Folk devils" is a term coined by Stanley Cohen (1972) to characterize social groups who come to be seen as threats to society. The concept has been theorized in many ways-from showcasing voiceless outsiders, to outspoken individuals defending themselves. The thesis troubles Cohen's original concept by showing an emerging folk devil narrative of redemption, examined through the case studies of two anti-vaxxer mothers who publically confess wrongdoing of their previous anti-vaccination stance. These acts of public confession, I show, are highly mediatized. Drawing from McAdams's (2006) theory of narrative identity, I pose critical questions of how redemption narratives not only challenge previous notions of folk devils, but also explore how they impact discourses of moral regulation. This study finds that folk devil redemption narratives illustrate identity reconstruction through the liminal state of exiting, imply self-policing mechanisms of conformity, and specifically with regard to the topic of the case studies, offer effective anecdotal strategies for vaccine promotion.iii Thank you all! iv

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The Troubled Public Sphere and Media Coverage of the 2003 Toronto SARS Outbreak

Cited by 9 publications

References 0 publications

Rights and Quarantine During the SARS Global Health Crisis: Differentiated Legal Consciousness in Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Toronto

Rights and Quarantine During the SARS Global Health Crisis: Differentiated Legal Consciousness in Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Toronto

Effective media communication of disasters: Pressing problems and recommendations

Forgive Me Child for I Have Sinned: Anti-Vaxxer Folk Devil Mothers and Narratives of Redemption

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