The COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly affected the lives of many across the globe. Its impacts and consequences have led to multiple researches as the general public continues to face new experiences and situations introduced by the pandemic. This has led to the discovery of phenomena and ideologies that need to be further explored and investigated.
Professor Dolezal’s informative lecture discussed pandemic shaming particularly focusing on shame and stigma faced by healthcare workers in 2020, during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. During the beginning of the pandemic in the UK pandemic shaming was a community driven phenomena where members of the public engaged in and policing the behavior, actions and intentions of others through public and often social media sensor (Dolezal 2021).
The lockdown period significantly increased the uncertainties and worries of the general public; Dolezal (2020) mentions, that various communities and groups began creating virtual groups on Whatsapp and Facebook with the aim of helping each other out through the dissemination of COVID-19 related information. As the surveillance moved online, the phenomena of online shaming was inculcated as spaces especially social media platforms, became the site for airing the personal and local grievances that occurred offline.
Dolezal and Rose (2020) highlights examples of Health practitioners like Dr. Chris Higgins who was publicly shamed by Jenny Macaca, Victoria’s Health Minister. She had called him out after testing positive for the coronavirus even though he had taken precautionary measures to keep himself and everyone around him safe. This led to causing his reputation and livelihood to suffer.
Stigma and shame have also been features of past pandemics as Health-care workers have also been shunned, and treated with suspicion during past epidemics. For example, doctors HIV wards in the UK during the 1990s described how anxieties around “contamination” led colleagues in other specialties to stigmatize their work as devalued and shameful. (Dolezal et al. 2021)
Across the globe stigma and shame on health care practitioners is also particularly prevalent. In Japan, during the COVID-19 pandemic, public health campaigns that challenged stigmatization and shaming of healthcare workers were needed and prioritized to shape the public conversation in ways that support public health. (Jecker, Takahashi 2021).
There are competing factors evident in multiple researches about why the pandemic shaming is prevalent. The feeling of fear resulting in erratic attitudes and behaviors among people, amidst infectious outbreaks is an understandable concept since anyone of any gender, and socio-demographic status can be infected. (Ho et al. 2020). Also, shaming could act a mechanism by which institutional stability is achieved for the profession of medicine. (Jarvis, 2016).
In Conclusion, this outbreak has highlighted the fragility of mental resilience and the need for the provision of coordinated psychological intervention (Ho et al. 2020). Therefore, there is an adverse effect on online shaming as it negatively affects healthcare workers albeit psychologically, emotionally, or economically. Regardless of why it’s being done, it has dire consequences and members of the general public should be sensitized on its negative impacts and consequences.
REFERENCES
Dolezal, L., 2021. COVID-19, online shaming, and health-care professionals. The Art of medicine. [Online], 398.
Ho, S.C., Chee, C.Y., and Ho, R.C., 2020. Mental Health Strategies to Combat the Psychological Impact of COVID-19 Beyond Paranoia and Panic. Annals, Academy of Medicine, Singapore [Online], In Press. Available From: http://www.anmm.org.mx/descargas/Ann-Acad-Med-Singapore.pdf [Accessed 25 January 2022]
Jarvis, L., 2016. Shame and institutional stability or change in healthcare. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy [Online], 36 (3,4) P.173-189.
Jecker, N.S., and Takahashi, S., 2021. Shaming and Stigmatizing Healthcare Workers in Japan During the COVID-19 Pandemic. Public Health Ethics [Online], In Press. Available From: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7928580/ [Accessed 25 January 2022]
Medical Humanities, 2020. Naming and Shaming: Covid-19 and the Medical Professional [Online]. 7 April 2020. Available From: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2020/04/07/naming-and-shaming-covid-19-and-the-medical-professional/ [Accessed 25 January 2022]
Shame and Medicine, 2022. Shame, Stigma and COVID-19 [Online]. Available From: https://shameandmedicine.org/shame-stigma-and-covid-19/ [Accessed 25 January 2022]