When an Epidemic Looms, Gagging Scientists Is a Terrible Idea

“They were taking precautions like wearing masks, but he ordered them not to talk about it,” Dr. Markel said. “But it was spreading so fast that attempts to cover it up were just silly.”

That pandemic became known as the Spanish flu — even though it first hit the American, English, French and German armies in Europe — because war correspondents were subject to military censorship. Reports of widespread deaths of young soldiers were considered bad for morale.

In neutral Spain, newspapers were free to report deaths on the front pages.

Message control also failed in Hamburg, Germany, in 1892, Dr. Markel noted. The city’s business and civic leaders conspired to suppress news of its cholera epidemic.

But word leaked out, and ships from Hamburg, a major port, became suspect and were refused entry when they tried to dock in the United States.

During the early 1980s, a mysterious illness appeared: Its victims slowly wasted away and died despite all attempts to save them. No one knew the cause, how it was transmitted or who, if anyone, was safe.

Because it struck hardest at groups who initially had no political power, including gay men, hemophiliacs, heroin users and Haitians, President Ronald Reagan for years did not even acknowledge the outbreak of what was first called Gay-Related Immune Disease and ultimately Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, or AIDS.

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But public health officials in cities like San Francisco were forced to confront it — and they realized that they had to institute policies that would mean asking victims extremely intrusive questions, including their sexual orientation and the names of all their sexual partners.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/28/health/coronavirus-pence-messaging.html