Essay on 21st Century Challenges: Improving Emergency Management & Global Health

Introduction

Owing to the increasing frequency and severity of disasters around the world, emergency management in different countries has greatly improved. The biggest improvement has arguably been experienced in the healthcare sector. The global health system has greatly enhanced its ability to combat various diseases. However, while much has been done to promote health, infectious diseases remain a major threat in the 21st century. Outbreaks witnessed in the past, such as the Zika virus, Ebola, Middle East Respiratory System (MERS), and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), have often called the constitution and effectiveness of the global health system into question (Bloom & Cadarette, 2019). The risk of infectious diseases, therefore, is a contemporary issue in emergency management that needs to be adequately addressed. Presently, the world is battling Coronavirus, which has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives and crippled various economies (McKibbin & Fernando, 2020). The global health system's response to the virus has also been questioned, revealing the need to ensure that all the core public health capacities for adequate preparedness and response are sustained (Kinsman et al., 2018). The rise of social media is another contemporary issue in emergency management. While social media can be beneficial during emergency response, it can also be used to spread fake news, which makes the situation worse. For instance, fake news was among the major challenges faced in the early days of the fight against Coronavirus. In this light, this paper seeks to discuss the risk of infectious diseases as well as the impact of social media in emergency management. The paper will particularly focus on the raging Coronavirus.

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The Risk of Infectious Diseases

The threat of infectious diseases in the 21st century is magnified by the rapid increase in population in regions with poor health systems, globalization, urbanization, civil conflict, climate change, as well as the changing patterns of transmission of pathogens between humans and animals (Bloom & Cadarette, 2019). The rapid population growth means that some regions of the world would not adequately handle an outbreak of an infectious disease. Owing to urbanization, people are increasingly living in closer quarters, a factor that increases the transmissibility of infectious diseases. Moreover, urbanization has been associated with the rise of slums. Sanitation is usually poor in slums, and basic commodities such as clean water are not easily accessible, further complicating the issue (Bloom & Cadarette, 2019). The world's population is also increasingly aging, placing a huge percentage of the global population at risk since the immunity of this demographic is low. As a result of climate change, the habitats of disease-causing vectors have changed, placing regions that were previously cushioned at a higher risk (Ogden & Gachon, 2019). The risk of bioterrorism also remains. For instance, attacks using the anthrax pathogen have been witnessed before (Bloom & Cadarette, 2019).

Though advances in medicine and improvements in sanitation and hygiene have significantly reduced the mortality rate of infectious diseases, the threat remains. As such, countries around the world should be prepared to address these challenges and also shield their citizens from the associated economic and social risks (Bonaccorsi et al., 2020). As proven by the COVID-19 pandemic, infectious diseases incur a huge social and economic burden on the world. There is also a need for collaboration between different organizations as well as greater surveillance and research to fill in any existing knowledge gaps in infectious diseases.

Emergency Management of Coronavirus in the United States

The United States is among the hardest-hit countries by the COVID-19 pandemic in the world. The country's response to the virus has been questioned severally, a factor that has exposed the flaws within its emergency management of infectious diseases. Blame has largely been directed at failures of judgment as well as inaction (Meraw, 2020). While the pandemic is unprecedented and mistakes were bound to happen, the country's response falls short when compared to that mounted by other countries. Experts have blamed the failure on insufficient capacity and preparedness, poor coordination and leadership, slow response, among others. The biggest failures, which significantly affected the trajectory of the pandemic, happened in the first phase of the outbreak. The federal government did not act on biosurveillance, and the capacity of the country to test and manage the disease was not boosted (Gerstein, 2020). Lack of coordination between the federal and state governments on the supply chain led to massive shortages of medical supplies and equipment (Gereffi, 2020). These factors show the need for the country to revamp its emergency management of infectious diseases, which, as discussed earlier, remains a huge threat in the 21st century.

The havoc wrecked by the pandemic in New York is a testament to the importance of coordination in emergency management. For instance, better coordination was witnesses in San Francisco and the surrounding regions. Resultantly, restrictions to public gatherings, a key weapon in the fight against COVID-19, was effected early enough. On the contrary, New York delayed in establishing such measures leading to more cases and casualties. The number of deaths recorded in the state is several times more than those seen in states such as Florida, Texas, and California, and even higher than the totals of some European countries (CDC, 2020).

The Impact of Social Media

The rise of social media presents several opportunities for emergency management. Various social media applications are even more effective than traditional media as a communication tool. For instance, the analysis of a disaster leads to higher situational awareness and reaches a bigger audience. Decision-makers can also monitor the response of the public and hence develop suitable measures (Luna & Pennock, 2018). However, the rise of social media also presents a myriad of challenges in emergency management. Chief among them is the negative impact of fake news during disasters. The spread of disinformation and misinformation during disasters cause confusion and pose a higher threat to the safety of the public.

The spread of fake news, particularly in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, significantly hampered the efforts established to contain it (Kadam & Atre, 2020). High proportion of citizens were exposed to misleading or false information, and some of them believed it. Resultantly, they flouted guidelines that experts had issued, hence putting their lives in danger. Besides, there were also instances where people with the symptoms of the disease tried unproven remedies. Owing to this fact, strategies of countering false information should be incorporated into emergency management. Such a measure will help curb the negative effects of social media during response to emergencies in the future.

Conclusion

As shown in the paper, the risk of infectious diseases, as well as the role of social media in spreading misinformation and disinformation, are among the most pertinent contemporary issues in emergency management. The huge impact of COVID-19 on the world is a testament to the need for more measures to boost the response of the global health system to outbreaks of infectious diseases. More collaboration and biosurveillance is among the strategies that could address the issue. Fake news spread via social media have also adversely affected the efforts to contain the virus. Therefore, strategies to counter misinformation should be incorporated into emergency management.

References

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CDC. (2020, July 23). United States COVID-19 Cases and Deaths by State. Retrieved from CDC: https://www.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#cases

Gereffi, G. (2020). What does the COVID-19 pandemic teach us about global value chains? The case of medical supplies. Journal of International Business Policy, 1-15. Retrieved from https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s42214-020-00062-w

Gerstein, D. M. (2020, April 24). Epic fail: Why the US wasn’t prepared for the coronavirus pandemic. Retrieved from Bulletin of Atomic Scientists: https://thebulletin.org/2020/04/epic-fail-why-the-us-wasnt-prepared-for-the-coronavirus-pandemic/

Kadam, A. B., & Atre, S. R. (2020). Negative impact of social media panic during the COVID-19 outbreak in India. Journal of Travel Medicine, 27(3), taaa057. Retrieved from https://academic.oup.com/jtm/article-abstract/27/3/taaa057/5822107

Kinsman, J., Angren, J., Elgh, F., Fuberg, M., Mosquera, P. A., Otero-Garcia, L., . . . Tsolova, S. (2018). Preparedness and response against diseases with epidemic potential in the European Union: a qualitative case study of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and poliomyelitis in five member states. BMC health services research, 18(1), 528. Retrieved from https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12913-018-3326-0

Luna, S., & Pennock, M. J. (2018). Social media applications and emergency management: A literature review and research agenda. International journal of disaster risk reduction, 28, 565-577. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S221242091830030X

McKibbin, W., & Fernando, R. (2020). The economic impact of COVID-19. Economics in the Time of COVID-19,, 45. Retrieved from https://www.incae.edu/sites/default/files/covid-19.pdf#page=52

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