• Where the Pandemic Will Take America in 2021 - The Atlantic
    https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/12/pandemic-year-two/617528

    Vietnam, the first country to contain SARS in 2003, “immediately understood that a few cases without an emergency-level response will be thousands of cases in a short period,” said Lincoln, the San Francisco State medical anthropologist, who has worked in Vietnam extensively. “Their public-health response was just impeccable and relentless, and the public supports health agencies.” At the time of my writing, Vietnam had recorded just 1,451 cases of COVID-19 all year, fewer than each of the 32 hardest-hit U.S. prisons.

    Rwanda also took the pandemic seriously from the start. It instituted a strict lockdown after its first case, in March; mandated masks a month later; offered tests frequently and freely; and provided food and space to people who had to quarantine. Though ranked 117th in preparedness, and with only 1 percent of America’s per capita GDP, Rwanda has recorded just 8,021 cases of COVID-19 and 75 deaths in total. For comparison, the disease has killed more Americans, on average, every hour of December.

    (Pour le Rwanda, PIH, l’association de #Paul_Farmer, n’y est pas pour rien)

    “We are too focused on high-tech and expensive health care. We’re set up to fail in a pandemic like this.”

    After the post-9/11 anthrax attacks in 2001, fears of bioterrorism encroached on American attitudes toward naturally emerging diseases. Preparedness was framed with the rhetoric of national security. Health experts developed surveillance systems for disease, simulated epidemics in war games, and focused on fighting outbreaks in other countries. “This came at the expense of investment in public health, equity, and housing—boringly crucial sectors that actually support human wellness,”

    approches sécuritaires ou sanitaires de la #santé

    “One cannot prevent a pandemic by preparing for a war, but that is exactly what the U.S. has been doing.”

    et dans l’article suivant, cité par Ed Yong, un remarquable graphique de l’absence totale de corrélation entre les critères habituels d’évaluation des systèmes de santé et l’impact du COVID-19.
    https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/all-bets-are-measuring-pandemic-preparedness