Amid an Outbreak
By Global Journalist Staff Posted Nov 3 2011
A veteran New York Times science and health reporter, Donald G. McNeil Jr. has covered AIDS, malaria, avian flu, SARS and swine flu.
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Watch this week's show and hear from our panel of expert journalists who cover disease and pandemics about how they accurately report on new diseases on the ground and in the newsroom.
Reporting on an international pandemic or widespread disease is a murky venture for a journalist, especially when new information about the disease constantly surfaces and misinformation permeates throughout the Web.
Journalists who cover pandemics and disease, such as Donald G. McNeil Jr., a veteran science and health reporter for The New York Times, take great lengths to ensure their reporting adheres to fact and not fiction. For years, McNeil has covered AIDS, malaria, avian flu, SARS and swine flu. He also wrote several comprehensive reports about the 2009 swine flu and has been intensively following the AIDS pandemic since he went to Africa in 1995.
McNeil spoke with Global Journalist about how he reports on pandemics, what steps he takes to protect himself from the contagious diseases he covers and whether there’s any truth to Hollywood’s latest film about a contagion spreading worldwide.
Global Journalist: What are some of the biggest challenges journalists face when covering pandemics?
Donald G. McNeil Jr.: When there’s an actual pandemic, the biggest problem is the confusion, the panic and people coming up to you and grabbing your arm and saying, “Oh my God, are people going to die?” But people’s moods change drastically. You saw that with swine flu, where at the beginning, everyone was terrified of it, and then, as soon as the vaccine was available, which took several months, everyone completely lost interest and wasn’t worried about it anymore. So, relatively few people got the shots, and then the rest of the world needed shots. But the U.S. and other big countries needed the shots themselves and never actually managed to get any of those shots to other countries.
GJ: What aspects do you think are important to include when you are reporting on pandemic diseases?
McNeil: The main question everyone wants to know when they read a story about an illness is, “Oh my God, am I going to get it, and if I do, is it going to kill me? And what about my kids?” And you have to sort of keep that in the back of your mind every time you write a story. Five people dying horribly in Indonesia doesn’t affect people nearly as much as somebody who is really sick and recovers, but lives a block away from them [the reader/audience]. It’s unfortunate but true. People care about themselves and their families, so you write sort of with that in mind. When there was the swine flu pandemic all over Mexico in 2009, people were interested and worried, but when it hit Queens a few days later, people were really panicked. You had this kind of series of waves of up and down panic and an indifference towards the disease that waxed and waned.
GJ: When you are out reporting on the ground, what are some of the methods you take to keep yourself safe from contracting a disease?
McNeil: It depends on what I am worried about. If I am going to Sierra Leone, I do different things than if I am going to Austria for a conference. When I went to Taiwan to cover the SARS outbreak, I took a bunch of masks and gloves, but Taiwan was packed with those things anyway because I could have found them there. The protection measures you take depend on the disease. I have all the typical shots, but that’s because I used to work in Africa, and I went into a travel clinic and said, “Shoot me with everything you’ve got.” So, I’ve had more shots than the average American has but not nearly as many as a worker in a bio-safety lab does.
GJ: What are some of the ways you, as a journalist, verify the information you receive, and where do you get that information?
McNeil: It depends on what story we’re talking about. We have an ongoing AIDS pandemic that has been going on the last 30 years. And I look at other things when talking about swine flu or bird flu; it all depends on the disease. But generally, you get fairly accurate, careful information out of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta and the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva. There are times when you aren’t happy with the information you are getting or the decisions they make, but most of the time, I think they are both extremely careful science-driven organizations.
GJ: In reporting on the potential danger of flu and warning people to stay vigilant, are you ever concerned that some reports from the media might cause panic among people?
McNeil: I don’t see my job as being a public health official; I see my job as a journalist. So my job is to tell the truth, and the truth is basically the one goddess I serve. Obviously, people care about this stuff, so in the same way another journalist who covers the White House wants to tell people accurately what the president did or didn’t do yesterday and what it means, I am trying to tell my audience how dangerous the virus is if it’s a virus, and how many people are killed, and what can be done about it. My job is telling the truth and getting the news out.
GJ: When you wrote the article about how the World Health Organization responded to the swine flue pandemic, what was your opinion of how the organization handled the situation?
McNeil: I would not characterize it in one simple sentence as good or bad. There were aspects of the World Health Organization’s response that were slow and confusing. And there were other aspects that some people characterized as panicky. It took the health organization a long time to admit that this really was a level-six pandemic, rather than just a disease outbreak in Mexico and in North America. The WHO didn’t take into account the severity of the disease; they only took into account that there was a new virus, how many geographic places were affected and whether there was sustained human-to-human transmission of that virus. But the problem is you can have a sustained human-to-human transmission of a not terribly serious virus on several continents, but you still have to call it a pandemic. But the minute you use the word pandemic you really scare people.
GJ: Who were some of the critics of the World Health Organization and what did they have to say?
McNeil: There was quite a bit of criticism particularly from one European legislator of the WHO, who said the whole effort to produce vaccines was a great big waste of time and money, and it was really a boondoggle to put money into the pockets of the vaccine companies. And the Institute of Medicines’ reports found no truth to that. The same people who consult to the vaccine companies also consult the WHO. They both consult with the top experts in the world, but flu is incredibly unpredictable; it’s like a hurricane. You don’t know whether or not the viruses are going to get worse or get milder. If people had died by the millions, those WHO officials will be thoroughly hated.
GJ: The newest pandemic movie, Contagion, hit the screens a few months ago, and some journalists have reported that the scenario in the film could happen. Should people be worried?
McNeil: Every disease is different, so it’s a little hard to say what the reality is going to be. But I think many of the things they did there were quite realistic, and the air of panic, false information and weird accusations that were characterized by Jude Law is definitely something that happens in pandemics. It’s usually not one powerful old person who everyone listens to; there are usually a lot of bloggers mouthing off about all sorts of things. And there are usually a lot of crazy rumors and false reports that one has to run down. Given what Hollywood does with reality, I thought they did a pretty good job.