Global narratives on unequal outcomes produced by lockdown in Africa: A social science perspective on the "one-size-fits all" COVID-19 response.

Introduction: Lockdown measures were introduced worldwide to prevent the spread of COVID-19, and several studies showed the positive impacts of these policies in places such as China and Europe. Many African governments also imposed lockdowns at the beginning of the pandemic. These lockdowns met with mixed reactions; some were positive, but others focused on concerns about the consequences of lockdowns. Methods: In this article, we use social listening to examine social media narratives to investigate how people balanced concerns about preventing the spread of COVID-19 with other priorities. Analyzing social media conversations is one way of accessing different voices in real time, including those that often go unheard. As internet access grows and social media becomes more popular in Africa, it provides a different space for engagement, allowing people to connect with opinions outside of their own conceptual frameworks and disrupting hierarchies of how knowledge is shaped. Results: This article indicates which narratives were favored by different organizations, stakeholders, and the general public, and which of these narratives are most dominant in policy discourses. The range of narratives is found to be reflective of the blindness to inequality and social difference of much decision-making by policymakers. Discussion: Thus, contrary to the "we are all in this together" narrative, diseases and public health responses to them clearly discriminate, accentuating long-standing structural inequalities locally, nationally, and globally, as well as interplaying with multiple, dynamic, and negotiated sources of marginalization. These and other insights from this article could play a useful role in understanding and interpreting how social media could be included in pandemic preparedness plans.

Health Communication and the Arts in the United States: A Scoping Review.

OBJECTIVES: Guided by the hypothesis that the arts can play a role in changing attitudes, beliefs, and health behaviors, the objectives of the study were to (1) overview artistic practices, interventions, and research being conducted at the intersection of the arts and health communication and (2) identify desired and observed outcomes and variables measured in these studies. DATA SOURCE: The search strategy was developed iteratively with 2 health science librarians and conducted using 8 databases (Applied Social Sciences Index and Abstracts, Art and Architecture Source, CINAHL, Communication and Mass Media Complete, ERIC, PsycINFO, PubMed, and Web of Science) and hand searching. Articles included were published between 2014 and 2018. STUDY INCLUSION AND EXCLUSION CRITERIA: Inclusion criteria include US nonclinical setting and use of the arts (broadly defined) to change health knowledge, beliefs, behaviors, or awareness. Any articles not meeting inclusion criteria were excluded. DATA EXTRACTION: Covidence's data extraction tool exported to MS Excel. DATA SYNTHESIS: This final set of results was analyzed and synthesized by research design, population, sample size, health issue, purpose, variables measured, and findings. RESULTS: In all, 78 articles met inclusion criteria. Number of participants ranged from 4 to 2140 (mean = 179); 61 (78.2%) outcome studies, including 8 experimental studies; 17 (21.79%) formative research or reports. Many different health topics were addressed and different art forms used. CONCLUSION: The arts can help build knowledge and awareness of health issues. The authors highlight the need to build an evidence base for arts and public health.

Vaccine anxieties, vaccine preparedness: Perspectives from Africa in a Covid-19 era.

Global debates about vaccines as a key element of pandemic response and future preparedness in the era of Covid-19 currently focus on questions of supply, with attention to global injustice in vaccine distribution and African countries as rightful beneficiaries of international de-regulation and financing initiatives such as COVAX. At the same time, vaccine demand and uptake are seen to be threatened by hesitancy, often attributed to an increasingly globalised anti-vaxx movement and its propagation of misinformation and conspiracy, now reaching African populations through a social media 'infodemic'. Underplayed in these debates are the socio-political contexts through which vaccine technologies enter and are interpreted within African settings, and the crucial intersections between supply and demand. We explore these through a 'vaccine anxieties' framework attending to both desires for and worries about vaccines, as shaped by bodily, societal and wider political understandings and experiences. This provides an analytical lens to organise and interpret ethnographic and narrative accounts in local and national settings in Uganda and Sierra Leone, and their (dis)connections with global debates and geopolitics. In considering the socially-embedded reasons why people want or do not want Covid-19 vaccines, and how this intersects with the dynamics of vaccine supply, access and distribution in rapidly-unfolding epidemic situations, we bring new, expanded insights into debates about vaccine confidence and vaccine preparedness.

Negotiating Intersecting Precarities: COVID-19, Pandemic Preparedness and Response in Africa.

This article shares findings on COVID-19 in Africa across 2020 to examine concepts and practices of epidemic preparedness and response. Amidst uncertainties about the trajectory of COVID-19, the stages of emergency response emerge in practice as interconnected. We illustrate how complex dynamics manifest as diverse actors interpret and modify approaches according to contexts and experiences. We suggest that the concept of "intersecting precarities" best captures the temporalities at stake; that these precarities include the effects of epidemic control measures; and that people do not just accept but actively negotiate these intersections as they seek to sustain their lives and livelihoods.

‘…but not gagged’: Responding to Covid-19 and its control measures in France, Italy and the USA

The beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic was far from the ?great equalizer? sometimes described by the media. This article shares themes emerging from research conducted in 2020 in France, Italy and the USA concerning responses to the pandemic and its social effects. The authors analyze how the pandemic elicited varied reactions within the three countries where they conducted anthropological fieldwork. They propose that narratives of the Covid-19 response can shed light on how individuals navigate social and political relationships in each context.