History 2186A/B Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Giovanni Boccaccio, Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome
23 Apr 2016
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
Disease panics in the modern world epidemic films are now hollywood standards. We should not panic about infectious diseases and focus more efforts on chronic diseases such as heart disease etc. Barry glassner - we panic about the wrong things most of the time, but panic and fear can be beneficial if directed at the right things properly. Modern world has tendencies to place blame of disease on things that are irrational. Ex: cholera outbreaks blamed on the poor in south america: the disease of the month club. Sars - severe acute respiratory syndrome (14% death rate) Mad cow - bovine spongiform encephalopathy (bse) o variant creutzfeldt-jakob disease (vcjd) (90% death rate) Avian flu - h5n1 (60% death rate) All of these diseases, were predicted to kill much more than they ever did: big pharma. Always under suspect by people to exploit fear or disease spread for money.
