{"id":642,"date":"2020-12-01T11:00:28","date_gmt":"2020-12-01T11:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.radiofree.org\/?p=129905"},"modified":"2020-12-01T11:00:28","modified_gmt":"2020-12-01T11:00:28","slug":"heath-officials-face-death-threats-from-coronavirus-deniers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2020\/12\/01\/heath-officials-face-death-threats-from-coronavirus-deniers\/","title":{"rendered":"Heath Officials Face Death Threats From Coronavirus Deniers"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Dr. Megan Srinivas<\/u> was attending a virtual American Medical Association discussion around the \u201cMask Up\u201d initiative<\/a> one evening in July when she began to receive frantic messages from her parents begging her to confirm to them that she was alright.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomebody obtained my father\u2019s unlisted cell phone number and spoofed him, making it look like it was a phone call coming from my phone,\u201d she told Des Moines\u2019s Business Record<\/a> for a November profile. \u201cEssentially they insinuated that they had harmed me and were on the way to their house to harm them.\u201d<\/p>\n

This malicious hoax, made possible by doxxing Srinivas\u2019s private information, was only the most severe instance of abuse and harassment she had endured since she became a more visible proponent of mask-wearing and other mitigation measures at the beginning of Covid-19 pandemic. A Harvard-educated infectious disease physician and public health researcher on the faculty of the University of North Carolina, Srinivas currently lives and works in Fort Dodge, her hometown of 24,000 situated in the agricultural heart of northwest Iowa.<\/p>\n

Srinivas is not just a national delegate for the AMA, but a prominent face of Covid-19 spread prevention locally, appearing on panels and local news segments. Fort Dodge itself is situated deep within Iowa\u2019s 4th Congressional District, a staunchly conservative area that simply replaced white supremacist Rep. Steve King with a more palatable Republican.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Basic health measures promoted by Srinivas in Iowa since the beginning of the pandemic have been politicized along the same fault lines as they have across the rest of the country. Some remain in the middle ground, indifferent to health guidelines out deep attachment to \u201cnormal\u201d pre-pandemic life. Others have either embraced spread-prevention strategies like mask-wearing or refused to acknowledge the existence<\/a> of the virus at all. In a red state like Iowa, an eager audience for President Donald Trump\u2019s misinformation<\/a> about the dangers of the coronavirus has made the latter far more common, which has made Srinivas\u2019s job more difficult and more dangerous.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Portrait of Dr. Megan Srinivas.<\/p>\n

\nPhoto: Courtesy of Dr. Megan Srinivas\/Erich Ernst<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt was startling at first, the volume at which [these threats were] happening,\u201d Srinivas told The Intercept. \u201cI know people get very heated about politics and the issues that people advocate for in general, but especially on something like this where it\u2019s merely trying to provide a public service, a way people can protect themselves and their loved ones and community based on medical objective facts. That\u2019s surprising that this is the reaction people have.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI have trolls like other people, I\u2019ve been doxxed, I\u2019ve gotten death threats,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen you say anything people don\u2019t want to hear, there will be trolls and there will be people who will try to argue against you. The death threats were something I wish I could say were new, but when I\u2019ve done things like this in the past, I\u2019ve had people say not-so-nice things in the past when I\u2019ve had advocacy issues.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

An untenable pressure has been placed on public health workers thrust in a politicized health crisis \u2014 and that pressure only appears to be worsening.<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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At the same time, as an Iowa native, Srinivas has been able to gain some trust through tapping into local networks like Facebook. Though she has encountered a great deal of anger, she\u2019s also seen success in the form of a son who\u2019s managed to convince his diabetic father, a priest, to hold off on reopening his church thanks to her advice, and through someone who\u2019s been allowed to work from home based on recommendations Srinivas made on a panel.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt this point, almost everyone knows at least one person that\u2019s been infected. Unfortunately, it leads to a higher proportion of the population who knows someone who\u2019s not just been infected, but who\u2019s had serious ramification driven by the disease,\u201d Srinivas said. \u201cSo it\u2019s come to the point where, as people are experiencing the impact of the disease closer to home, they\u2019re starting to understand the true impact and starting to be willing to listen to recommendations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Without cooperation and support at the state level, however, what Srinivas can accomplish on her own is limited. Even as the number of Covid-19 cases grew and put an increasing strain on Iowa\u2019s hospitals over the past few months, it took until after the November election for Iowa\u2019s Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds to tighten Iowa\u2019s mask guidance. And board members in Webster County, where Srinivas lives, only admitted in November that she had been right to advocate for a mask mandate all along. Though Trump lost the election nationally, he won Iowa by a considerable margin<\/a>, which Reynolds has claimed as a vindication of her \u201copen for business\u201d attitude<\/a> and has continued downplaying the pandemic\u2019s severity.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe issue with her messaging is it creates a leader in the state that should be trusted who\u2019s giving out misinformation,\u201d Srinivas said. \u201cNaturally, people who don\u2019t necessarily realize that this is misinformation because it\u2019s not their area of expertise want to follow what their leader is saying. That\u2019s a huge issue under the entire public health world right now, where we have a governor that is spreading falsehood like this.\u201d<\/p>\n

The embattled situation in which Srinivas has found herself is the new normal for public health officials attempting to stem the tide of a deadly viral outbreak, particularly in the middle of country where the pandemic winter is already deepening. Advocating for simple, potentially lifesaving measures has become a politically significant act, working to inform the public means navigating conflicting regulatory bodies, and doing your job means making yourself publicly vulnerable to an endless stream of vitriol and even death threats. The result across the board is that an untenable pressure has been placed on public health workers thrust in a politicized health crisis \u2014 and that pressure only appears to be worsening.<\/p>\n

Despite the fact<\/u> that Wisconsin\u2019s stay-at-home order was nullified<\/a> by the state\u2019s Supreme Court in May, the Dane County Health Department has used its ability to exercise local control in an attempt to install mitigation measures that go beyond those statewide. By issuing a mask mandate ahead of a statewide rule and advocating for education and compliance efforts, the department currently considers itself in a good place regarding health guideline compliance.<\/p>\n

These actions have drawn a lot of ire from those unhappy with the regulations, however. According to a communications representative for the department, anti-maskers have held a protest on a health officer\u2019s front lawn, a staff member was \u201cverbally assaulted\u201d in a gas station parking lot (an incident that prompted the department to advise its employees to only wear official clothing to testing sites), and employees performing compliance checks on businesses have been told to never perform these checks alone after \u201cinstances of business owners get a little too close for comfort.\u201d They\u2019ve also received a number of emails accusing health workers of being \u201cNazis,\u201d \u201cliars,\u201d \u201cpolitical pawns,\u201d and purely \u201cevil.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Kansas<\/p>\n

Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, left, confers with Clay Britton, her chief attorney, before a meeting with legislative leaders about an executive order she issued to require people to wear masks in public, on July 2, 2020, at the Statehouse in Topeka, Kan.<\/p>\n

\nPhoto: John Hanna\/AP<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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In Kansas\u2019s Sedgwick County, Wichita \u2014 the largest city in the state \u2014 has been considering new lockdown measures after a November surge<\/a> in coronavirus cases has threatened to overwhelm its hospitals. Though Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly attempted to instate a mask mandate in July, 90 of the state\u2019s 105 counties rejected<\/a> it, including Sedgwick, though the health board issued its own directive and Wichita had installed its own at the city level.<\/p>\n

Now, with cases surging again, just as Srinivas saw the number of believers rising as more got sick, counties in Kansas that previously resisted mask mandates are changing their tune after Kelly announced a new mandate<\/a>. But Sedgwick County health officials see an intractable line in the sand when it comes to who\u2019s on board with mitigation measures and are focused more on what those who are already on board need to be told.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt seems like a lot of the naysayers are naysayers and the supporters are supporters,\u201d Adrienne Byrne, director of Sedgwick County Health Department, said. \u201cThere\u2019s some people that are just kind of whatever about it. We just remind people to wear masks, it does make a difference. As we\u2019ve gone on, studies have shown that it works.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI think it\u2019s important to acknowledge to people that it is tiring, to acknowledge and validate their experience that people want to be over this stuff, but it\u2019s important to reinforce that we are in a marathon,\u201d she said. \u201cIn the beginning, we all wanted to hear that we would reach a magical date and we would be done with this stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sedgwick has managed the streams of angry messages but has seen her colleagues in rural counties endure far worse, including death threats. She knows of one public health worker in Kansas who quit after being threatened, and others who have cited the strain of the politicized pandemic as their reason for leaving the public health profession.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re certainly losing some health officials, there\u2019s no question about that,\u201d said Georges Benjamin, president of the American Public Health Association. \u201cIn the long arc of history, public health officials are pretty resilient. And while it absolutely will dissuade people from entering the field, we all need to do a better job of equipping them for these issues in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Benjamin would like to see institutional and public support for public health workers resemble that given to police or firefighters, government professionals who are well-funded, believed to be essential to the functioning of society, and wielding a certain level of authority.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor elected officials who are charged with protecting the officials and their public officials, our message to officials then is that they should protect their employees,\u201d Benjamin said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Signs<\/p>\n

Signs encourage the wearing of face masks, on June 18, 2020, at a Sarpy County office in Papillion, Neb., where face covering is recommended but not mandatory.<\/p>\n

\nPhoto: Nati Harnik\/AP<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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In rural Nebraska<\/u>, the situation has presented even more complex challenges to public health workers. Outside of Omaha, the rural expanse is ruled by a deeply entrenched conservatism and, like Iowa\u2019s governor Reynolds, Nebraska\u2019s Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts has resisted a mask mandate. The Two Rivers Public Health Department, which oversees a wide swath of central Nebraska and its biggest population center, Kearney (population 33,000), is a popular pit stop along the Interstate 80 travel corridor and home to a University of Nebraska outpost.<\/p>\n

Prior to the pandemic, Nebraska\u2019s decentralized public health system had seen significant atrophy, according to Two Rivers Health Director Jeremy Eschliman, and was wholly unprepared for this level of public health event. There were few epidemiologists to be found outside of Omaha, though the department was able to hire one earlier this year. It also became clear early on that, despite the department\u2019s traditionally strong ties with local media, messaging around the pandemic would be an uphill battle to get people to adapt new habits, especially when the president was telling them otherwise.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was one clear instance I remember when I caught a bit of heckling when I said, \u2018Hey, this is serious. We\u2019re going to see significant death is what the models show at this point in time,\u2019\u201d Eschliman said. \u201c[The station said], \u2018Are you serious? That seems way out in left field\u2019 or something to that effect. That station had a very conservative following and that was the information they received.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eschliman has taken a realistic stance to promoting mask-wearing, thinking of it as akin to smoking. (\u201cYou could walk up to 10 people and try to tell them to quit smoking and you\u2019re not going to get all 10 to quit,\u201d he said. \u201cFun fact: You\u2019re not going to get more than maybe one to even quit for a small period of time.\u201d) Over the summer, he traveled just over Nebraska\u2019s southern border into Colorado, where he was struck by the night-and-day difference between his neighbor state\u2019s adoption of mask-wearing and Nebraskan indifference to it, each following the directives of their state leaders.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s become very difficult to do the right thing when you don\u2019t have the political support to do so.\u201d<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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Home rule is the law of the land in Nebraska, and there\u2019s been strong rural opposition to mask mandates, despite more liberal population centers like Lincoln and Omaha installing their own. It\u2019s taken Kearney until November 30 to finally install its own after outbreaks at the college and in nursing homes. Public health care workers have also been left on their own to make controversial decisions that have caused political friction. In May, the local health board voted not to share public health information with cities and first responders due to what they decided were issues of information confidentiality.<\/p>\n

\u201cMayors, county board members, and police chiefs ran a sort of a smear campaign against me and the organization,\u201d Eschliman said. \u201cSo when we talk about resiliency, that\u2019s what we\u2019re dealing with. It\u2019s become very difficult to do the right thing when you don\u2019t have the political support to do so.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even having a Democratic governor doesn\u2019t necessarily ensure that support. In Hill County, a sparsely populated region of Montana\u2019s \u201cHi-Line\u201d country along the Canadian border, Sanitarian Clay Vincent supports Gov. Steve Bullock\u2019s mask mandate, but doesn\u2019t understand why it exists if it\u2019s not enforceable. The way he sees it, if laws are made, they should create consequences for those who refuse to follow them.<\/p>\n

But Vincent and the Hill County Health Board also saw what happened elsewhere in the state, in Flathead County, where lawsuits were brought against five businesses who refused to follow Bullock\u2019s mask mandate. After a judge threw the lawsuit out, those businesses launched a countersuit<\/a> against the state, alleging damages. In order to bring businesses in Hill County into compliance with the mask mandate, the health board is considering slapping them with signs identifying them as health risks or, barring that, simply asking them to explain their refusal to comply.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are community members. Everybody knows everybody and [the board isn\u2019t] trying to make more of a division between those who are and those who are not, but I come back to the fact that public laws are put there for the main reason to protect the public from infectious diseases,\u201d Vincent said. \u201cYou have to support the laws, or people sooner or later don\u2019t give any credence to the public health in general.\u201d<\/p>\n

Regardless of whether they can push the Hill County businesses into compliance, the political winds are already changing in Montana. Republican Gov.-elect Greg Gianforte will take power in January and likely bring the party\u2019s aversion to mask mandates with him. President-elect Joe Biden will take power at the same time, and even if he attempts to install a nationwide mask mandate, it will likely be difficult to enforce<\/a> and may end up meaning little out in Montana. It will also likely exacerbate ongoing tensions in communities throughout the state. The building that houses Hill County Health Department in the town of Havre was already closed this summer out of fear that a local group opposed to the mask mandate and nurses doing contract tracing are routinely threatened in the course doing their jobs.<\/p>\n

Regardless, Vincent is determined to encourage and enforce public health guidelines as much as it\u2019s in his power to do so, no matter the backlash. He sees protecting the public as no different than preventing any other kind of disease. \u201cI don\u2019t care if it\u2019s hepatitis or HIV or tuberculosis or any of these things,\u201d he said. \u201cYou\u2019re expected to deal with those and make sure it\u2019s not affecting the public. Otherwise you have a disaster.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n

This post was originally published on Radio Free<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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