Eco-Anxiety and Planetary Hope: Experiencing the Twin Disasters of COVID-19 and Climate Change

This timely volume examines the conflict between human individual life and larger forces that are not controllable. Drawing on recent literature in phenomenological and existential psychology it calls for a more nuanced understanding of the human predicament. Focusing on the co-occurring crises of climate change and the COVID-19 epidemic, it explores the nature of widespread anxiety and the long-term human consequences. It calls for an expansion of current research that would include the arts and humanities for critical insights into how this essential conflict between humanity and nature may be reconciled. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.

A Hybridized Stochastic SIR-Vasicek Model in Evaluating a Pandemic Emergency Financing Facility

In the context of the present global health crisis, we examine the design and valuation of a pandemic emergency financing facility (PEFF) akin to a catastrophe (CAT) bond. While a CAT bond typically enables fund generation to the insurers and re-insurers after a disaster happens, a PEFF or pandemic bond's payout is linked to random thresholds that keep evolving as the pandemic continues to unfold. The subtle difference in the timing and structure of the funding payout between the usual CAT bond and PEFF complicates the valuation of the latter. We address this complication, and our analysis identifies certain aspects in the PEFF's design that must be simplified and strengthened so that this financial instrument is able to serve the intent of its original creation. An extension of the compartmentalized deterministic epidemic model-which describes the random number of people in three classes: susceptible (S), infected (I), and removed (R) or SIR for short-to its stochastic analog is put forward. At time t, S(t), I(t), and R (t) satisfy a system of interacting stochastic differential equations in our extended framework. The payout is triggered when the number of infected people exceeds a predetermined threshold. A CAT-bond pricing setup is developed with the Vasicek-based financial risk factor correlated with the SIR dynamics for the PEFF valuation. The probability of a pandemic occurrence during the bond's term to maturity is calculated via a Poisson process. Our sensitivity analyses reveal that the SIR's disease transmission and recovery rates, as well as the interest rate's mean-reverting level, have a substantial effect on the bond price. Our proposed synthesized model was tested and validated using a Canadian COVID-19 dataset during the early development of the pandemic. We illustrate that the PEFF's payout could occur as early as seven weeks after the official declaration of the pandemic, and the deficiencies of the most recent PEFF sold by an international financial institution could be readily rectified.

Hydrogen Bonding (Base Pairing) in Antiviral Activity.

Base pairing based on hydrogen bonding has, since its inception, been crucial in the antiviral activity of arabinosyladenine, 2'-deoxyuridines (i.e., IDU, TFT, BVDU), acyclic nucleoside analogues (i.e., acyclovir) and nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs). Base pairing based on hydrogen bonding also plays a key role in the mechanism of action of various acyclic nucleoside phosphonates (ANPs) such as adefovir, tenofovir, cidofovir and O-DAPYs, thus explaining their activity against a wide array of DNA viruses (human hepatitis B virus (HBV), human immunodeficiency (HIV) and human herpes viruses (i.e., human cytomegalovirus)). Hydrogen bonding (base pairing) also seems to be involved in the inhibitory activity of Cf1743 (and its prodrug FV-100) against varicella-zoster virus (VZV) and in the activity of sofosbuvir against hepatitis C virus and that of remdesivir against SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19). Hydrogen bonding (base pairing) may also explain the broad-spectrum antiviral effects of ribavirin and favipiravir. This may lead to lethal mutagenesis (error catastrophe), as has been demonstrated with molnutegravir in its activity against SARS-CoV-2.

FASTER Project Technologies: A Reality of the Future

FASTER is an H2020 research project, within the European framework, in which Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) teams, in addition to other first responders, conduct an on-theground assessment of latest support technologies. These technologies are to be used in victim rescue response situations well as for coordination and safety procedures between disaster responders in diverse types of catastrophe scenarios. The tools have been developed by technical partners of the FASTER project committee and, with the aim of assessing the tools, two pilot exercises were conducted in collapsed buildings in Spain, simulating the impact of two earthquakes. The objective is to integrate and adapt the FASTER tools in initial interventions during the search for and rescue of victims. The focus is placed on information gathering in the disaster area, among other aspects. Simulation exercises were conducted in real locations involving collapsed buildings using drones, unmanned vehicles, canine wearables, a mobile command centre, a weather station and social network analysis, with real people acting the part of victims together with human dummy figures. Through these exercises, an assessment was carried out of the acceptability, ease of use, applicability, efficiency, and effectiveness of FASTER technology. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic during the implementation of various pilot exercises was a setback that led us to introduce a USAR Camp deployment procedure involving preventive anti-COVID-19 measures, in accordance with the recommendations of official organisations such as INSARAG and the WHO. © 2023 by Nova Science Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved.

Assessment of a pandemic emergency financing facility

The pandemic bond issued by the World Bank (WB) in 2017 is a financial innovation enabling the transfer of the pandemic risk from the underdeveloped/developing countries to the financial market. It covers perils of various diseases that could overwhelm the global health systems and adversely impact the world economy. If all the triggers are activated, the bond's principal and coupons are used to finance coordinated, swift and resilient medical response to safeguard the well-being of the populace. This product, however, is criticised for its onerous trigger requirements. We examine the WB's pandemic-bond pricing framework, which requires inputs that are only partially available. From a rather unstructured COVID-19 data set, an information database is created and customised for pandemic-bond valuation. A vector auto-regressive moving average model is utilised to jointly describe the triggers dynamics. Our modelling simulations of risk triggers reveal that the bond payout could be made in less than half of the WB's earliest opportunity of 85 days. © 2023 The Authors

Emergency as a problem of our time

The significance of the work is determined by the current situation in the modern world: climate change, accompanied by catastrophic consequences for humanity, including the coronavirus pandemic. All these phenomena provide grounds for considering and improving both the essence of the concepts of «emergency situation» and their definitions, which will make it possible to find mechanisms for the rational use of resources to compensate and/or prevent them. In accordance with this, the tasks were set: to compare the known definitions of emergency situations, to identify and clarify the relationship between the formulation of emergencies and their content, to clarify their relationship with disasters, to identify the main stages of their development, and general mechanisms that can allow them to more effectively resist them. It is proposed to revise the normative definition of an emergency situation. © 2022 Zaporizhia Medical Academy of Post-Graduate Education Ministry of Health of Ukraine. All rights reserved.

DISASTER SCENARIOS IN KATHRIN RÖGGLA'S DIE ALARMBEREITEN

The paper delves into how Kathrin Röggla, an Austrian author, approaches the problem of tackling the topic of catastrophe in her book die alarmbereiten published in 2010. Röggla, nowadays considered one of the most socially committed and engage authors in Germany's contemporary literature domain, deals relentlessly with such issues as crisis, catastrophe, alarmism and fear in modern-day society. The media occupies one of the most pivotal roles in this process. Hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, extreme cold, unbearable heat and attendant fires, volcanic eruptions are just some of the natural disasters the world endured during the preceding year and all of which was easily accessible and covered in detail in print and electronic media. We should not forget the political crises, for instance the one in Afghanistan or the migrant crisis on the border between Belarus and the European Union. The conflict concerning Ukraine and the economic crisis regarding the blockade of the Suez Canal, just to mention a few. Based on of these examples, it is clear that the themes of crisis and catastrophe are permanently present in modern life. On a global scale, the world has been grappling with a dire crisis, for almost two years now - the coronavirus pandemic. It is easy to see how the world has changed and quite significantly over the course of the ongoing pandemic. It is also celar that all these phenomena lead to consequences in the lives of all of us. The state of emergency has actually become a normal state. Austrian author Kathrin Röggla writes about many of these topics in her book die alarmbereiten. In the seven chapters, she constantly re-enacts settings and circumstances in which a person must be readily prepared for a new crisis or catastrophe. The media have a special role in this discourse, portraying the crisis in such a way so as to reaffirm that in today's world and society, humankind can no longer feel safe and has a persistent feeling that life and existence are permanently threatened. In addition to literary works, the author deals with the issue of catastrophe and crisis in many poetic texts, essays and interviews. The author, born in 1971 in Salzburg, has lived and worked in Berlin since 1992. She has won numerous awards, including the Bruno Kreisky Award for Political Book (2004), and the New York-Stipendium des Deutschen Literaturfonds, which seems to have had a particularly meaningful impact on the author's choice to write about crisis, disaster and the media. Owing to aforementioned award, Röggla accidentally happened to be in New York on September 11, 2001, just a few blocks from the attack. In numerous articles, she underscores that she was fascinated by catastrophes even before that event, but that her personal presence at the events in New York influenced her in the sense that the state of emergency after the attack was most interesting for her because she wanted to see how American society, the media, politicians and civil society would react to the catastrophe, and how they dealt with this new reality since in fact their reaction to the what had occurred is a story about their society. The author often points out that she actually writes about our everyday life and how that everyday life is increasingly determined by the "grammar of catastrophe". It is precisely this "grammar of catastrophe" that interests her most. The language she incorporates plays a very important role in her works. Röggla believes that in modern times, citizens no longer feel like citizens, but like figures who helplessly observe events: either as spectators or as victims. In such situations, a person feels insignificant and too small to do anything on their own. She insists on writing all her works in lower case, in the conjunctive and in indirect speech: the self-narrator no longer appears as someone who speaks directly, but others speak on their behalf. The book die alarmbereiten is a remake of the play worst case performed in 2008. And the chapter wilde jagd is based on the play die beteiligten. Before the text was publish d in the form of a book, the author presented the text to the public as a radio play of the same name, which was chosen as the radio drama of the month in August 2009. The aim of this article is to analyze the first three chapters of this book in terms of content and narrative theory. This is interesting first and foremost because there is no traditional narrator in the text. The traditional understanding of the instance narrated about is framed in indirect speech and recalibrated. It is differently made evident what someone said about someone else at the time of a given situation. It is often reported from the I-perspective in the conjunction with what others have said about the I-figure. At the same time, the I-figure is often criticized, objections are made at the expense of, but the I-figure per se never speaks. From the aspect of theory, this is a very interesting technique employed by the author. Regarding this technique, she herself said that there is one constant in the book, namely the I that narrates. It is constituted viewpoint of others: it is often demonized, ignored and condemned. It can be surmised that the figures in this book are not classic and they have no personal identity since they do not speak for themselves. The title itself suggests that this is a group of people who are always ready to react in various crisis / alarming situations and who are always ready to wait for the next disaster. Alarmed people who constantly reckon with the worst. Röggla opens the book, and at the same time the first chapter die zuseher with sentences that associate the reader with prospective impending catastrophes such as fires, floods, stormy winds, and so forth. This text is in italics and resembles instructions for actors in theater performances;it is preceded by a drawing by Oliver Grajewski. The drawing can be associated with both the title of this chapter and the opening sentences. An unspecified narrative instance alludes to the possible or real impending catastrophes. That voice sounds prophetic and terrifies the reader. The initial formulation, which is repeated over and over again, may correspond to the title of the chapter through the position of perception, but these anticipations of future catastrophes can also refer to the content of other chapters of the book. In the third section, this indefinite and undefined position changes and the view and focuses on the recipients who observe certain events. They are present for them, but they are not affected by the events, and therefore they do not understand them and feel bored. But the question is: Is that really the case? After these lines, the picture changes completely and the reader is confronted with the protocols of the four sessions. The events are set in a hotel in Los Angeles, where a group of business representatives is conducting an exercise to simulate behavior in the event of an impending disaster. From the first protocol, it appears that the planned leader of the group has disappeared, and together with him, the protocol. From the following pages we learn that the leadership of the group is taken over by another person, while it remains unclear whether the designated leader disappeared because he did not follow the rules or his disappearance is the first task that the group needs to successfully overcome. The group aims to devise certain strategies on how to best respond to a disaster by observing parking in front of a shopping mall and the behavior of people in the event of a disaster. Since the new group leader is not trained for the job, he uses familiar patterns from movies and stories to try to organize the group and motivate it to take an active part in the situation. But nothing happens in the parking lot of the shopping center, the group gets bored and one by one the participants leave the sessions, while it also remains unclear whether the disappearance of some members of the group is a predetermined scenario or happens because individuals do not cooperate. It is interesting that the participants in the exercise are completely focused on the events they are observing, that is. They are fully focused on the future. They completely miss the fact that they themselves are part of the scenario that is happening in the present, that is. That someone observes them and their reactions. This is unambiguously demonstrated in Oliver Grajewski's illustration where one female person sits or lies watching the multitude of screens in front of her on which something is happening. In the end, the leader of the group is left alone with the protocol officer and cannot believe that this is the end of the exercise. In such an outcome, he is the only one to whom something tragic is happening, which we learn from the words of the protocol officer, who reports that after the protocol is over, he must seek help, although it is against certain rules of the agency. This scenario is undeniably reminiscent of present-day reality shows – possibly a critical note of Röggla's text. Also, he confirms the author's words that today we are all either observers or victims of events, and not active participants. I is equally clear that the scenarios of narratives about catastrophes are so ingrained in the consciousness of modern man that in anticipation of such spectacular scenarios we are unable to recognize a catastrophe that unfolds before our very eyes. This chapter is written in the form of the minutes of four sessions of the group and it alternately uses the technique of direct and indirect speech, with indirect speech in the conjunctiva predominating. The chapter, according to the nature of the protocol, is written on-form and directly or indirectly conveys the voices of the exercise participants, mostly the group leader. But his words are often given in indirect speech in the conjunctiva, which is ameans of distancing oneself from the events themselves, but also from the words spoken. The votes, therefore, belong to the participants in the seminar, but it is not clear which narrative instance transmits their votes, that is. Who narrates? The second chapter die ansprechbare is about a night phone conversation. Two female figures appear. In the text, we learn that the two of them are friends and that this is just one of the many phone conversations they have. The first female figure is marked as a self-narrator, from which it could be concluded that the situation is presented from her perspective. But she does not narrate in her own name, that is. Her words are not transmitted directly, but are given from the perspective of her telephone interlocutor. As a self-narrator, she makes a series of apocalyptic predictions about natural disasters that threaten in the near future or have already begun, and are caused by climate change. Among other things, water and fire are themed, and that will prove to be an anticipation of future events. This female figure bases her panic fears on the statements of experts, ie. He transfers them from the second hand, and Röggla draws attention to the events in modern society, where we find many self-proclaimed and self-proclaimed experts, by thematizing this "secondary expert knowledge". The importance of this topic to the author is evidenced by the fact that the issue of this secondary expert knowledge is dealt with in other chapters of this book. The self-narrator of this second chapter is in a constant state of emergency, while her interlocutor tries to alleviate her fears and predictions. In the continuation, this self-figure is named as Cassandra, and the mention of the famous prophetess from antiquity who predicted the apocalyptic events that will really follow, and which no one believed, has a certain role in predicting the tragic end of the interlocutor. In an effort to relativize the fears of the narrative self, she does not react at the right time and in the right way to the real danger - fire - and dies due to inadequate treatment in a state of real catastrophe. Consistent lowercase writing and the use of conjunctives also characterize this chapter. The issue of narrative instance is very complex in this part of the text. Although it is st ted that this is a telephone conversation between two friends, the word "conversation" can hardly be used to describe what is being told in the text. It is actually a report of a telephone conversation. What is very unusual is that the narrative self does not speak in its own name anywhere, but the words of that narrative self are given from the perspective of the telephone interlocutor, who conveys the recapitulated words of the narrative self from all perspectives, giving them a certain emotional note. The third chapter der übersetzer deals with the issue of translation, focusing on the issue of the economic crisis. An unnamed translator has the task of referring an unnamed interlocutor to a professional economic or business vocabulary. Although the main protagonist of the chapter is a translator, he does not speak for himself anywhere in the text, but his words are conveyed in the form of a monologue by his "student". What all three chapters of the book have in common is that each of them deals with a different problem: potential natural disasters that do not occur, death due to fire or panic fear caused by climate change, and the great economic crisis. All these topics, as well as a number of others, which are discussed in other chapters, are anticipated by the prophetic words from the beginning of the first chapter. From the aspect of the way of narration in the analyzed chapters, consistent writing in lower case is noticeable, the use of conjunctives, narrative self, but narrative self which never narrates in its own name, i.e., it is never directly announced, but his words are transposed through someone else's perspective, or through the perspective of a friend or through the perspective of a student. Also, a different media aspect was applied in all three chapters: in the first they were sessions, in the second a telephone conversation, and in the third a seminar / class. What all the figures have in common is that they are not typical figures, they do not have any personal identity, but are actually voices that indicate certain problems in society. A small number of voices appear, usually two, so the author simulates a speech situation, which is actually absent because that speech situation is reduced to a monologue of one of the voices. The texts are also characterized by the disappearance of figures, which is noticeable in all three texts. Together with all the analyzed chapters, a tragic end was realized or hinted at, in the second explicitly a fatal outcome. In all three scenarios, the figures are both / or observers and / or victims, as the author pointed out in her poetic texts. In this way, it points to the image of the society in which we live. © 2022 by the Author(s).

Role of error catastrophe in transmission ability of virus.

The role played by error catastrophe is explicitly taken into account in a mathematical formulation to analyze COVID-19 data. The idea is to combine the mathematical genetics formalism of the error catastrophe of mutations in virus gene loci with the standard model of epidemics, which lacks the explicit incorporation of the effect of mutation on the spreading of viruses. We apply this formalism to the case of SARS-CoV-2 virus. We assume the universality of the error catastrophe in the process of analyzing the data. This means that some basic parameter to describe the error catastrophe is independent of which group (country or city) we deal with. Concretely, we analyze Omicron variant data from South Africa and then analyze cases from Japan using the same value of the basic parameter derived in the South Africa analysis. The excellent fit between the two sets of data, one from South Africa and the other from Japan, using the common values of genetic parameters, justifies our assumption of the universality of these parameters.

Catastrophe bond pricing in the primary market: The issuer effect and pricing factors

COVID pandemic has highlighted the importance of hedging against catastrophic events, for which the catastrophe bond market plays a critical role. Our paper develops a two-level modelling and uses a unique, hand-collected dataset, which is one of the largest and most detailed datasets to date containing: 101 different issuers, 794 different bonds, spanning 1997–2020. We identify issuer effects robustly, isolating them from bond specific pricing effects, therefore providing more credible pricing factor results. We find that bond pricing and volatility are heavily impacted by the issuer, causing 26% of total price variation. We also identify specific issuer characteristics that significantly impact bond pricing and volatility, such as the issuer's line of business accounting for up to 36% of total price variation. We further find that issuer effects are significant over different market cycles and time periods, causing substantial price variation. The size and content of our data also enables us to identify the counter-intuitive relation between bond premiums and maturity, and bond premiums and hybrid bond triggers. © 2022 Elsevier Inc.

Contesting the crisis narrative: epidemic accounts in Sierra Leone, Tanzania, and Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Scientists and global commentators watched African countries closely in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, predicting an impending disaster: the virus was projected to overwhelm already weak health systems. These expectations were informed by imaginaries of Africa as an inevitable site of epidemic disaster. This paper draws on accounts from Sierra Leone, Tanzania, and Democratic Republic of the Congo to contrast global catastrophe framings with everyday imaginations and experiences of crisis and crisis management. Utilising ethnographic research, the paper initially explores how COVID-19 was understood in relation to previous epidemics, from HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) to Ebola, as well as political conflict. It then considers how global crisis narratives both inform and are in tension with everyday collective and personal experiences. The paper brings these empirical reflections into a conversation with theoretical debates on the discursive construction of crisis and its effects, and argues that these tensions matter because crisis framings have consequences.

‘If I get Corona, I get Corona': COVID-19 protocols and beach tourism in Pinellas County, Florida

When COVID-19 emerged in January of 2020, few anticipated the duration and global reach of this disaster event. This paper reports on the ethnographic findings of Rob Porter who found himself ‘locked down' in Pinellas County, Florida at the beginning of the pandemic. Using ethnographic research methods including participant observation, interviews, and photography this essay reports on the changing nature of the tourism industry;supply chain challenges and substitutions;public health mandates;and political messaging. All of these variables significantly influenced the health and sustainability of the tourism industry in Pinellas County. Finally, we explore the need for adaptation in the industry so that it can weather future disaster events. © 2022 Canadian Association for Leisure Studies / Association canadienne d'études en loisir.

[Response of the intensive care unit of a French military teaching hospital to the 1st COVID-19 wave]. / Réponse du service de réanimation d'un Hôpital d'Instruction des Armées à la première vague de COVID-19.

In March 2020, the intensive care unit of the French military teaching hospital Bégin (Saint-Mandé) had to make profound changes to deal with the first COVID-19 epidemic wave. First, the twelve beds of the intensive care unit (ICU) were allocated to COVID-19 patients, among them four beds usually dedicated to postoperative care. Then, on the model of the military medical-surgical facilities rolled out in external operations, a new transient intensive care unit was set up in Bégin within four days. This strategy of increasing capacities had to address a crucial challenge: to ensure safe and quality health care with limited resources. Based on precise specifications and an essential strengthening of staff and supplies, 20 additional ICU care rooms were fully equipped in the cardiology department of the hospital. Eventually, 32 ICU beds were available from March 20, performing a 300% increase in bed capacities. During the whole epidemic wave, 113 patients were managed. The evacuation of 16 stable patients with medicalized trains toward less impacted French regions helped to avoid saturation. The service has also been involved in various research activities, including the DisCoVeRy European clinical trial evaluating the effectiveness of several antiviral treatments. Leaving the operating room and the post-interventional surveillance room partially functional made it possible to quickly resume the elective surgical activity after the crisis, while keeping the transient ICU available in case of an epidemic rebound, as happened in the autumn of 2020, then in the spring of 2021.

Catastrophe bond pricing in the primary market: The issuer effect and pricing factors

COVID pandemic has highlighted the importance of hedging against catastrophic events, for which the catastrophe bond market plays a critical role. Our paper develops a two-level modelling and uses a unique, hand-collected dataset, which is one of the largest and most detailed datasets to date containing: 101 different issuers, 794 different bonds, spanning 1997–2020. We identify issuer effects robustly, isolating them from bond specific pricing effects, therefore providing more credible pricing factor results. We find that bond pricing and volatility are heavily impacted by the issuer, causing 26% of total price variation. We also identify specific issuer characteristics that significantly impact bond pricing and volatility, such as the issuer’s line of business accounting for upto 36% of total price variation. We further find that issuer effects are significant over different market cycles and time periods, causing substantial price variation. The size and content of our data also enables us to identify the counter-intuitive relation between bond premiums and maturity, and bond premiums and hybrid bond triggers.

For Preparedness as Transformation

In this paper we point out the topic and the rational of the symposium aiming on the one hand to connect preparedness to the uncertainty that characterizes society-environment relation, on the other hand to emphasise the need for sociology not only to denounce the governmental implications of preparedness but also to engage constructively with this category. We begin by recalling the framework changes that have characterized the social sciences??? understanding of disasters by showing how progressively the idea of disaster as a one-time event that disrupts a society from the outside has been complemented by an idea of disaster as a critical moment embedded in historically determined social structures. We will then discuss how the emergence of the preparedness paradigm fits within these developments and how sociological research can help to better understand what is at stake in the governing of (and by) preparedness. In this perspective we advance a reading of preparedness from the vantage point of knowledge. As a conclusion, we discuss how the understanding of preparedness as dependent on socio-ecological transformation raises specific challenges for territorial governance.

Médecine de catastrophe ou médecine des situations sanitaires exceptionnelles : quels enseignements pour demain ?

Résumé L’enseignement de la médecine de catastrophe a débuté en France dans les années 80. De nombreux médecins urgentistes s’inscrivent chaque année à la capacité de médecine de catastrophe qui est l’enseignement le plus représentatif de ce domaine. Cette capacité comprend un enseignement théorique, des travaux pratiques et un exercice de simulation. Des exercices interservices de grande ampleur comme ceux réalisés dans le cadre de la capacité de l’UFR de Médecine de l’Université Paris Cité permettent une mise en situation proche de la réalité. Cependant la médecine de catastrophe ne couvre qu’une partie des situations sanitaires exceptionnelles (SSE). Des exemples récents ont montré qu’il faut élargir l’enseignement de la capacité à ce nouveau domaine. Il est nécessaire d’étendre cet enseignement par des formations adaptées aux SSE destinées auprès des étudiants en médecine des deuxième et troisième cycles et aux personnels paramédicaux, afin que tous aient des connaissances de base sur cette thématique. Summary The teaching of disaster medicine began in France in the 1980s. Many emergency physicians register each year for the disaster medicine “capacity”, which is the most representative training program in this field. This capability includes theoretical courses, workshop and a disaster drill. Large-scale interdepartmental drills such as those carried out within the framework of the capacity of the UFR of Medicine of the University of Paris Cité, allow a situation close to reality. However, disaster medicine only covers a part of exceptional health situations (SSE). Recent examples have shown that it is necessary to extend the area of the capacity to this new domain. It is also necessary to develop training adapted for medical students in the second and third cycles and for paramedical personnel so that all of them has a basic knowledge of the subject.

Veiller, agir, prévenir : de la médecine de catastrophe à la gestion médicale des situations sanitaires exceptionnelles

Résumé Comme toute activité médicale et comme toute activité de soins, la régulation médicale porte en elle une dimension éthique. Elle est même avant tout éthique. C’est le sujet de la première partie de cet article qui s’appuie sur la distinction et la conjonction entre éthique de la conviction et éthique de la responsabilité telle qu’elles furent exposées par le sociologue allemand Max Weber. Les actions déroulées par les SAMU durant la pandémie de COVID-19 ont exacerbé le rôle politique de la régulation médicale. La deuxième partie tente d’en faire la démonstration. Le rôle de santé publique et politique des SAMU, désormais reconnu par tous les citoyens et tous les appareils de l’État, amène nécessairement à une redéfinition de la médecine dite de catastrophe. Summary Like any medical activity and like any healthcare activity, medical regulation carries with it an ethical dimension. Even more it is all ethical. This is the subject of the first part of this article, which is based on the distinction and the conjunction between the ethics of conviction and the ethics of responsibility as they were exposed by the German sociologist Max Weber. The actions carried out by SAMUs during the COVID-19 pandemic have exacerbated the political role of medical regulation. The second part attempts to demonstrate this. The public health and political role of SAMUs, now recognized by all citizens and all State services, necessarily leads to a redefinition of so-called disaster medicine.

An afterword on future directions in disgust research: A global pandemic, a divided world, and an environmental catastrophe

There is a notable irony in editing a book about an emotion that specifically evolved to help us avoid getting sick during the emergence of the first global pandemic in a century. This irony notwithstanding, here marks a unique point in human history for research into disgust. How the emotion functions, is altered, or utilised, as part of the behavioural immune system during a once-in-a-lifetime international health crisis will likely be of interest to many. In this afterword, we provide reflections on editing the volume during the ongoing COVID-19 crisis and an editorial perspective on areas of particular importance for future disgust research related to global challenges, of which the current pandemic is one, and a rise in nationalism and stimulating sustainable consumption are others. In each area, we briefly review what is known and, moreover, describe research opportunities for the better understanding, regulating, and/or leveraging of disgust in the context of each challenge. Our hope is to inspire more work on disgust in each of these international problems, which has the potential to contribute to betterment in our (collective) lives. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)

LOGIC OF CATASTROPHE — DEEPER LOGIC OF REALITY

The huge change brought about by the coronavirus pandemic contains some structural characteristics that define it as a catastrophe. The text explores and offers an outline of a possible analysis of some of the logical and normative features of this phenomenon. Catastrophes are not crises, they are unpredictable, not self-inflicted, accompanied by scarce knowledge or ignorance, and imply some restraints coming from necessities that are their consequences. One of the most important of those consequences are restraints in what in normal circumstances were valid rights, especially those rights that are privileges, i.e. rights that depend on the clause that they won’t be “consumed” by all — implying that in such rights “all” does not imply “everyone”. At the end, the issue of reciprocity and responsibility towards others is briefly mentioned, and especially the phenomenon of widespread indifference towards others. © 2022, Russian Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.

Philosphy and Culture in the Times of Pandemics

Unprecedented in its scope pandemic of coronavirus, which started in 2019 in China and is lasting up to this day has set before the researchers an array of very serious problems. These problems are triggered by what makes pandemics a catastrophe, but a catastrophe of a special kind. The four horsemen of Apocalypse symbolize these catastrophes, representing irresponsible governing, pandemics, famine and death, following, as history indicates, one after another, although the order may be different. The specificity of the pandemic catastrophe is that it, being promulgated by natural reasons, creates problems, immediately stemming from the specific circumstances of life under the conditions of quarantine and threat to life and health. These circumstances change the live word of the human being and the order of his institutions. At the same time many of the problems, caused by it, are stemming immediately from the characteristic of the pandemics as a crisis of value. The comprehension of this crisis in general and in its particular implications became the goal of this issue, comprised of the articles, based on some of the papers presented on the XII International conference of the School of Philosophy and culture studies of the NRU HSE “Philosophy and Culture in the Time of Pandemics”, which took place from 30 September to 2 October 2021 in Moscow. © 2022, Russian Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.

COVID-19 and Imperial Value: Commodity Chains, Global Monopolies, and Catastrophe Capitalism

Why has the COVID-19 pandemic manifested itself differently in different parts of the capitalist world-economy? The analysis here examines the way in which the system of “imperial value,” as articulated by Samir Amin and others, has governed the relations of individual nation states to the onset of SARS-CoV-2. The result is enormous disparities between the Global North and the Global South, as well as between countries that are relatively more capitalist and those that are relatively more socialist, along the socioeconomic spectrum. The impact of COVID-19 is thus mediated by a country’s position within the global value chain dominated by monopolistic multinational corporations. In this way, the structure of the contemporary world system has only served to worsen the global effects of the pandemic, in line with the general character of today’s catastrophe capitalism. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of International Critical Thought is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)