Fiji marked the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and Girls  this week with the government saying the day is a reminder that for too many women and girls violence is a daily reality — not a headline or a statistic.

The day also kicked off 16 days of activism against gender-based violence — a worldwide UN campaign running from November 25 to December 10.

The country’s Minister for Women, Children and Social Protection Sashi Kiran told Parliament violence against women and girls was not limited to the private sphere — “it permeates every dimension of society”.

“Addressing this issue is therefore not only a woman’s matter; it is a national priority — requiring engagement from every sector, every institution and every leader in our country.

“It manifests in various forms including physical, emotional, sexual and economic abuse as well as harmful practices such as trafficking.”

She said the cost of violence against females was estimated to be equivalent to seven percent of Fiji’s gross domestic product (GDP), affecting families, the health system, productivity and the nation’s development.

“The cost of violence is not only emotional — it is national.”

She pointed out several statistics, including that around 60 percent of Fijian women had experienced some form of violence in their lifetime; girls as young as 13 remained the most vulnerable to sexual assault; and from 2020-2024, more than 4000 child sexual offences were reported — most involving young girls.

“Our response must be survivor-centred, and above all accessible to everyone — including women and girls with disabilities and those from diverse sexual orientations and gender identities.”

In the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) Western Pacific Region, more than a quarter of girls and women experience some form of intimate partner or sexual violence.

But WHO said in several Pacific island countries and areas, the prevalence of lifetime intimate partner violence is as high as one in two women.

WHO’s western Pacific director, Dr Saia Ma’u Piukala, said governments and communities must use data to drive stronger policies, scale up prevention efforts, and invest in health system readiness, “so every girl is protected and woman is empowered”.

WHO said while the numbers were grim, a survey on “health system readiness to respond to interpersonal violence” pointed to an encouraging policy environment.

“Many countries are integrating strategies to prevent violence against women and girls into their national multisectoral plans, and acknowledging the key role that health systems must play in tackling this societal problem.

“However, the survey also highlights challenges in implementing these strategies.”

It is not all bad news in the region though — Cook Islands police have reported a decrease in the number of assault cases against women this year.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has warned Aotearoa New Zealand to urgently close the “alarming” gaps in measles immunisation, particularly among Māori and Pacific communities.

A WHO review last year found measles vaccination rates were at their lowest since 2012, and said the country was at risk of another large outbreak if those gaps were not filled.

Aotearoa eliminated measles in 2017, but saw a major outbreak in 2019 that infected more than 2000 people and hospitalised 700, many of them young children.

There are now 10 confirmed cases across Manawatū, Nelson, Northland, Taranaki, Wellington and Auckland, raising fears of wider community spread.

Only 72 percent of Māori under five years old are vaccinated, compared with 82 percent across the general population. To stop outbreaks, at least 95 percent coverage is needed.

Public Health Director Dr Corina Grey said the Ministry of Health shared WHO’s concerns.

“We know Māori and Pacific children are still missing out — that’s something we have to fix,” she said.

Serious risk
Pacific health researcher Chris Puliuvea said there is serious risk, specifically for Pacific communities.

“There is a 95 percent level where we need to be [with immunisation]. I believe we may even be behind the general population. For example, in the Bay of Plenty, vaccination rates are well behind other ethnic groups in that region,” Dr Puliueva said.

Dr Puli’uvea warned that measles can be easily spread.

“There is a serious concern at the moment. One infected person could affect up to 18 other people. The virus lingers in the air for several hours, which encourages spread. It’s far more infectious than COVID-19, and that’s a concern for our Māori and Pacific communities,” Puli’uvea said.

“I think what makes it also difficult is that you can be infected with the virus at very early stages and not show symptoms until four days later, so you could be infectious and you could be spreading it.

“Obviously it will take time to report that incident. So I think there is a serious concern at the moment, and the reason why I have this concern is why the vaccination rates are not where [they’re] meant to be,” he added.

Dr Puli’uvea said the lower vaccination rates among Māori and Pacific communities was a complex issue, although there are several reasons.

Key covid lessons
“It’s a difficult question . . .  key lessons from covid-19 showed us the importance of engaging with communities, particularly the faith community, and addressing misinformation and disinformation.

“That’s one of the inequalities.

“Other inequities are just excess people not being able to find time to go and get vaccinated over because they’re at work, or just lots of other things, finding the time to go and get vaccinated is one of them.

“The other thing that I’ve found is some people are not sure if they are immunised, particularly for those born in the 1990s onward,” he said.

Dr Puli’uvea encouraged families to vaccinate even if they were unsure about their vaccination status.

“With MMR, I simply encourage people to go and get vaccinated. There’s no harm in getting the full course again. It protects not only the individual but also prevents spreading the virus,” Dr Puli’uvea said.

The Ministry of Health has expanded vaccination access through pharmacies, GPs, and health centres, and offered incentives for on-time childhood immunisations.

“Every child vaccinated helps protect the whole community,” Dr Grey said.

They also explained that people can check records and get free MMR vaccinations from their GP, pharmacy, or local clinic.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The chair of a World Health Organisation (WHO) advisory group is urging world leaders to denounce misinformation around health.

Sir Collin Tukuitonga is reacting to comments made by US Senator Robert F Kennedy, who claimed that measles was not the cause of 83 deaths in Samoa during a measles outbreak there in 2019.

Samoa’s Head of Health Dr Alec Ekeroma rejected Kennedy’s claim, calling it a “complete lie”.

Speaking to RNZ Pacific Waves, Sir Collin said leaders had a duty to protect people from inaccurate public health statements.

He said he was “absolutely horrified” that the person who “is the most influential individual in the US health system” could “tell lies and keep a straight face”.

“But [I am] not surprised because Kennedy has a history of subscribing to fringe, incorrect knowledge, conspiracy theories, and odd things of that type.”

He said Dr Ekeroma was very clear and direct in his condemnation of the lies from Kennedy and the group.

‘Call it for what it is’
“I encourage all of our people who are in a position to call these people for what it is.”

Sir Collin is the chair of the WHO’s Strategic and Technical Advisory Group on the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases.

He said Kennedy’s comments and attitude toward vaccination will feed the anti-vaxxers and and discourage parents who might be uncertain about vaccines.

“So, [it is] potentially going to have a negative impact on immunisation programmes the world over. The United States has a significant influence on global health policy.

“These kinds of proclamations and attitudes and ideologies will have disastrous consequences.”

He believes that the scientific community should speak up, adding that political and business leaders in the region should also condemn such behaviour.

He said Washington is a major contributor to the money needed by WHO, which works to protect world health, especially vulnerable communities in developing countries.

“I understand they contribute about a fifth of the WHO budget,” he said.

“The United States is a world leader in the technical, scientific expertise in a number of areas, that may not be as available to the rest of the world.

“Research and development of new medicines and new treatments, a large chunk of which originates in the United States.

“The United States falling out of the chain of surveillance and reporting of global outbreaks, like Covid-19, puts the whole world at risk.”

He added there were ‘a good number of reasons” why the move by the US was “shameful and irresponsible”.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Surveillance and better vaccine coverage is needed to prevent another measles outbreak in the Pacific, says the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) Western Pacific regional director.

Dr Saia Ma’u Piukala said many children missed out on routine vaccinations — including measles and rubella — during the covid-19 pandemic.

According to WHO, measles cases jumped by 225 percent — from just over 1400 cases in 2022 to more than 5000 last year — in the Western Pacific region.

“I think the health workforce were concentrating on covid-19 vaccinations and forgot about routine vaccinations, not only for measles, but other routine immunisation schedule,” Piukala told RNZ Pacific.

“People are going back to fill the gaps.”

From 2022 to 2023, 11 countries in the Western Pacific, including Fiji, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, Palau and Papua New Guinea, conducted nationwide measles and rubella vaccination campaigns.

Catch-up successful
Piukala said the catch-up campaigns had been successful.

“That will definitely reduce the risk,” he said.

“No child should get sick or die of measles.”

In 2019, Samoa had an outbreak that killed 83 people off the back of an outbreak in Auckland.

Piukala said the deaths made people understand the importance of measles and rubella vaccinations for their children.

Fiji, Guam, French Polynesia and New Caledonia are the only countries or territories that have local testing capacity for measles, with most nations sending samples to Melbourne for testing.

Piukala said WHO plans for Samoa, the Cook Islands, and the Solomon Islands to have testing capacity by 2025.

“The PCR machines that were made available in Pacific Island countries during the covid pandemic can also be used to detect other respiratory viruses, including the flu, LSV, and measles and rubella.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The World Health Organisation’s decision to remove covid-19 as a global health emergency is the right move, epidemiologist Professor Michael Baker says.

The organisation said the virus was now an established and ongoing health issue that no longer constituted a public health emergency of international concern.

Professor Baker said the global status change made sense at this stage, but it did not impact on whether covid-19 was still a pandemic.

Covid-19 was still New Zealand’s number one killer when it came to infectious disease and people should make sure they were vaccinated and take sensible precautions, he said.

“There might be some scaling down in the international reporting of cases, but really it doesn’t make a difference to somewhere like New Zealand.

“It makes no practical difference whatsoever to how countries manage this infection.”

1000 NZ deaths predicted this year
Professor Baker earlier said that this year covid-19 was on track to kill some 1000 people in New Zealand and hospitalise around 10,000.

The threat of long covid also loomed — with one recent study suggesting as many as one in five New Zealanders reported lingering symptoms after their first infection.

He emphasised the need for caution in easing our few remaining protections.

The latest vaccine was one of the best things people could do to guard against the disease, because it included protection against omicron — the current dominant variant circulating in the community.

“You have to always think why the World Health Organisation assigned it [a global health emergency originally] and it’s really related to these certain criteria.

“It is about how severe and how unexpected [the disease is], but it’s really about whether an international response is needed and whether there’s potential for international spread.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared the covid outbreak in the Marshall Islands a Public Health Emergency.

A total of 571 new omicron cases of the virus were recorded in the latest 24-hour reporting period.

Three people have died and more than 10 percent of the population in the capital Majuro have tested positive, according to the Marshall Islands Ministry of Health and Human Services.

The WHO has declared the outbreak as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern.

All schools will be closed for the next two months, just one of the measures under the government’s disaster management plan.

The number of positive cases has skyrocketed from a handful on August 8 to more than 1000 by the weekend.

RNZ Pacific’s Marshall Islands correspondent Giff Johnson said the outbreak had led to staff shortages at many businesses.

“Everybody’s operation is affected. I went next door to buy some drinks and the owner is doing the cash register … all cashiers are out of action with covid. The Post Office had to close down because so many people came down with covid.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Late last month, New Zealand Health Minister Andrew Little stated what most who work in health already know.

Healthcare is all about people – the people being cared for and the people doing the caring.

Population growth, ageing and a pandemic mean there is no shortage of those needing care, but in New Zealand and globally, there is a chronic shortage of healthcare workers.

Little stopped short of calling it a crisis, but researchers and international agencies alike agree with a survey of New Zealand doctors that the health workforce is in crisis.

In 2016, the World Health Organisation (WHO) projected a global shortage of 18 million healthcare workers by 2030. That was before the covid-19 pandemic. Between 80,000 and 180,000 healthcare workers have died globally during the pandemic’s first 16 months, according to the WHO’s conservative estimate.

“Public statements from political leaders that there is ‘no crisis’ in the health system have seemed increasingly out of step with doctors’ experience over the past year” https://t.co/dXMhA38XIO

— Emma Espiner (@emmawehipeihana) July 11, 2022

Add to this the impact the pandemic has had on the mental health of frontline health staff, including reports of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and a healthcare workforce seven times more likely to have severe covid and now carrying the burden of long covid.

It’s clear healthcare is no longer the attractive sector it once was.

A highly mobile workforce and a global shortage
Like the cost-of-living crisis, the health workforce shortage is not unique to Aotearoa New Zealand.

This year’s budget included NZ$76 million for medical training and primary care specialists, but doctors who started training this year will not be specialists until 2034.

Meanwhile, Labour’s solution is to undertake an international recruitment drive. It is hailing New Zealand as one of the easiest places in the world for healthcare workers to come to. But are our newly opened borders attractive enough?

Overseas recruitment drive for nurses gains ‘good response’ https://t.co/RZrM4fW67L

— RNZ News (@rnz_news) July 13, 2022

In my health economics lectures I often use an anecdote about the Indian doctor who gets a job in the UK (colonial ties and a multicultural society), the British doctor who moves to Canada (less administration and more family friendly hours), the Canadian doctor who moves to the United States (specialists have much higher earning potential), and the US doctor who undertakes missionary work in India.

This highlights two issues: the health workforce is highly mobile and employment isn’t always about money. Aotearoa New Zealand is competing in a global health workforce market, and minister Little recently acknowledged the health sector as “fiercely competitive”.

But this isn’t a new phenomenon for New Zealand.

The health workforce in New Zealand has one of the largest shares of migrant workers, with 42 percent of doctors and almost 30 percent of nurses foreign-born (second only to Israel and Ireland, respectively). This is much higher than the aggregate estimates showing one in six doctors practicing in OECD countries studied overseas.

The OECD estimates the number of foreign-born doctors and nurses in OECD countries has increased by 20 percent, twice the growth rate of the overall increase across the workforce. This is what is most concerning.

The health workforce is not equally distributed. Migration of workers from low- and middle-income countries to high-income countries like Aotearoa New Zealand is a real threat to achieving universal health coverage and sustainable development goals.

New Zealand needs to be mindful that promoting our open borders is not at the expense of under-performing health systems with much greater need.

Losing healthcare workers to Australia
Outflow is also a problem in New Zealand, with New Zealand-trained doctors and nurses crossing the Tasman every year. Add to this the international recruits leaving New Zealand for Australia and there most definitely is a health workforce crisis.

As our nearest neighbour, Australia is aggressively recruiting staff. And like pavlova and Phar Lap they are happy to claim what is ours as theirs. An easier route to citizenship and voting rights will make Australia even more desirable.

How can New Zealand compete in this market? Minister Little refers to encouraging New Zealanders to return home, including lifting their pay. Research shows it’s not all about income. Location and professional development opportunities are important factors when choosing career moves.

The healthcare reforms helped tempt me back to New Zealand after 22 years away. Perhaps working in a system which has equity as its focus may encourage those who are clinically trained to return as well.

There is considerable research to inform policies around retention and recruitment. The New Zealand Ministry of Health may wish to look to the UK, which was historically dependent on EU health and care workers and now has a health workforce depleted by both Brexit and the pandemic.

In the recent LSE-Lancet Commission on the future of the NHS, British scholars argued a sustainable workforce needed integrated approaches to be developed alongside reforms to education and training that reflect changes in roles and the skill mix, and more multidisciplinary working.

The LSE-Lancet Commission authors flagged the need for better workforce planning. New Zealand’s approach to workforce forecasting has also been criticised previously.

Planning aside, a possible solution worthy of discussion is the required skill mix of the workforce, particularly with technological advancements and changing health needs. For example, the introduction of non-medical prescribers has improved job satisfaction, released clinical time and increased patient access.

New Zealand’s once-in-a-generation health reforms offer a logical time to undertake workforce reforms. We need to learn from our own historical mistakes and avoid disconnecting the workforce from the policy reforms.

If minister Little and the ministry are to solve this, he will first need to admit there is a health workforce crisis.

Aotearoa New Zealand is unfortunately not alone in its quest to adequately staff healthcare, but the transformation of the health sector to create a more equitable, accessible, cohesive and people-centred system means New Zealand is uniquely placed to put those people who deliver care at the centre.

Dr Paula Lorgelly is professor of health economics, University of Auckland. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark says the global handling of the covid-19 pandemic is marred with failures, gaps and delays.

Clark is a co-chair of the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response and is urging nations to spend less time debating commas in committees and instead get on with implementing the panel’s proposed reforms.

These include new financing of at least $10 billion a year for pandemic preparedness, and negotiations on a global pandemic treaty.

Clark told RNZ Morning Report the wheels were in motion on the structural responses the panel had called for but progress was slow.

“The wheels grind slowly but they are grinding,” she said, noting that the World Health Assembly (WHA) would meet for a special session next week and the sole item on the agenda was discussing whether to begin negotiating a treaty aimed at preventing future pandemics.

“I’m quite optimistic that they [the WHA] will embark on negotiations — now what they negotiate is another matter, but the process is kind of under way.”

If the WHA decided to move forward with treaty negotiations it would be only the second global public health treaty, after a 2003 accord to control tobacco use.

Unequal global response
Speaking in London overnight, at the launch of a six-month accountability review into the report commissioned by the World Health Organization (WHO) and published by the panel, Clark criticised the unequal response globally to the current pandemic’s more immediate challenges.

“There hasn’t been an equitable supply of tools to fight the pandemic, despite the sincere efforts of many people,” she said.

“We’ve talked a lot about vaccines, but many countries have lacked adequate access to other basics such as diagnostics, therapeutics, personal protective equipment, and even oxygen.”

She told Morning Report the panel had recommended reforms that addressed those inequalities, including dedicated financing for pandemic preparedness and a redesigned “end-to-end” platform that could control the flow of essential medical goods in the event of a future pandemic.

“That’s quite a big ask and in many ways this will be the hardest of all the asks that we had because it does require confronting the current way that the WTO (World Trade Organisation) deals with intellectual property,” Clark said.

The issue of intellectual property rights was already a hot topic, she said, adding that India and South Africa were leading the change in pushing for “the waiver of intellectual property rights in the event of pandemics, including this one”.

More than 257 million people have been reported to be infected by the SARS-CoV2 coronavirus and 5.4 million have died since the first cases were identified in central China in December 2019, according to a Reuters tally.

215 new cases in NZ
in New Zealand, the Ministry of Health reported 215 new community cases and one death, a patient in their 50s At Auckland City Hospital who was admitted to hospital on November 17.

This took the total of deaths to 40 since the pandemic began.

Clark said a key part of “how to do better next time” globally would hinge on reforms required at the WHO itself and admitted the slow progress on deciding what those reforms should be was “frustrating”.

The next regular meeting of the WHO was in late May next year and that would focus on the reform programme, she said.

“While it’s slow and it’s frustrating and we’re coming up, at the end of next month, to the two-year anniversary since what was then a novel coronavirus – which isn’t now so novel – was first identified, the wheels are in motion on these structural responses.”

‘We’re by no means through this’
Clark told Morning Report the newest wave of covid-19 infections in Europe was “largely avoidable” and should serve as a warning to New Zealand not to let its guard down.

“What we’ve seen in … developed countries that are capable of administering a vaccine rollout [is] they then tend to throw out all the other measures,” she said.

She was scathing of images she had seen showing almost no one on the London underground wearing masks: “Can we be surprised that there’s tens of thousands of cases a day?”

She said both the WHO and the panel’s report advocated the ongoing use of public health measures in addition to vaccination.

“Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. Don’t be satisfied …

“In New Zealand, when you get to even 90 percent of vaccination of eligible people, don’t throw away the rest of the toolkit because you need it to control transmission among those who aren’t vaccinated,” Clark said.

“It’s a complex story but we’re by no means through this.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

While the covid-19 pandemic’s relentless cyclone continues across the globe wreaking havoc on economies and social systems, this book sheds light on the adversarial reporting culture of the media, and how it impacts on racism and politicisation driving the coverage.

It explores the global response to the covid-19 pandemic, and the role of national and international media, and governments, in the initial coverage of the developing crisis.

With specific chapters written mostly by scholars living in these countries, Covid-19, Racism and Politicization: Media in the Midst of a Pandemic examines how the media in Australia, Bangladesh, China, India, New Zealand, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Taiwan and the United States have responded to the pandemic, and highlights issues specific to these countries, such as racism, Sinophobia, media bias, stigmatisation of victims and conspiracy theories.

This book explores how the covid-19 coverage developed over the year 2020, with special focus given to the first six months of the year when the reporting trends were established.

The introductory chapter points out that the media deserve scrutiny for their role in the day-to-day coverage that often focused on adversarial issues and not on solutions to help address the biggest global health crisis the world has seen for more than a century.

In chapter 2, co-editor Dr Kalinga Seneviratne, former head of research at the Asian Media Information and Communication Centre (AMIC) takes a comprehensive look at how the blame game developed in the international media with a heavy dose of Sinophobia, and how between March and June 2020 a global propaganda war developed.

He documents how conspiracy theories from both the US and China developed after the virus started spreading in the US and points out some interesting episodes that happened in the US in 2019 that may have vital relevance for the investigation of the origins of the virus.

Attacks on WHO
The attacks on the World Health Organisation (WHO), particularly by the former Trump administration, are well documented with a timeline of how WHO worked on investigating the virus in its early stages with information provided from China.

The chapter also discusses the racism that underpinned the propaganda war, especially from the West, which led to the Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s controversial call for an “independent” inquiry into the origins of the pandemic that riled China.

“The covid-19 pandemic has exposed the inadequacies and inequalities of the globalised world. In an information-saturated society, it has also laid bare many political economy issues especially credibility of news, dangers of misinformation, problems of politicisation, lack of media literacy, and misdirected government policy priorities,” argues co-editor Sundeep Muppidi, professor of communications at the University of Hartford in the US.

“This book explores the implications of some of these issues, and the government response, in different societies around the world in the initial periods of the pandemic.”

In chapter 3, Muppidi examines specifically the US media coverage of covid-19 and he explores the “othering” of the blame related to failures and non-performances from politicians, governments and media networks themselves.

Yun Xiao and Radika Mittal, writing about a study they have done on the coverage in The New York Times during the early months of the covid-19 pandemic, argue that unsubstantiated criticism of governance measures, lack of nuance and absence of alternative narratives is indicative of a media ideology that strengthens and embeds the process of “othering”.

Ankuran Dutta and Anupa Goswani from Gauhati University in Assam, India, analyse the coverage of the covid-19 crisis in five Indian newspapers using 10 key words. They argue that the Indian media coverage could be seen as what constitutes “Sinophobia” with some mainstream media even calling it the “Wuhan Virus”.

Historical background
They trace the historical background to India’s anti-China nationalism, and show how it has been reflected in the covid-19 coverage, especially after India became one of the world’s hotspots.

“This Sinophobia hasn’t much impacted on the government policy; rather it has tightened its nationalist sentiments promoting Indian vaccines over the Chinese.” They say the Indian media’s Sinophobia has abated after the delta variant hit India.

“The narrative concerning covid-19 has taken a sharp turn bringing out the loopholes of the government’s inability to sustain its vigilance against the virus,” he notes, adding, ‘considering the global phobia concerning the delta variant put India in a tight spot and India has to defend itself from its newfound identity of being the primary source of this seemingly untameable variant.”

Zhang Xiaoying from the Beijing Foreign Studies University and Martin Albrow from the University of Wales explain what they call the “Moral Foundation of the Cooperative Spirit” in chapter 4.

Drawing on Chinese philosophical traditions—Confucianism, Daoism and Mohism—they argue that the “cooperative spirit” enshrined in these philosophies is reflected in the Chinese media’s coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic in its early stages. Taking examples from the Chinese media—Xinhua, China Daily, Global Times and CGTN—they emphasise that the Chinese media has promoted international cooperation rather than indulge in blame games or politicising the issue.

This chapter provides a good insight into Chinese thinking when it comes to journalism.

Chapters on Sri Lanka and New Zealand examine how positive coverage in the local media of the governments’ initially successful handling of the covid-19 pandemic has contributed to emphatic election victories for the ruling parties.

Hit on NZ media industry
David Robie, founding director of Auckland University of Technology’s Pacific Media Centre, explains in his chapter how New Zealand’s magazine sector was devastated by the pandemic lockdowns and economic downturn, although enterprising buy-outs and start-ups contributed to a recovery.

He points out that a year later, in April 2021, Media Minister Kris Faafoi, himself a former journalist, announced a NZ$50 million plan to help the media industry deal with its huge drop in income, because, as he says, Facebook and Google were instrumental in drawing advertising revenue away from local media players.

The chapter from Bangladesh offers a depressing picture of the social issues that came up as the virus spread, such as the stigmatisation and rejection of returning migrant worker who have for years provided for families back home, and how old people were abandoned by their families when they were suspected of having contacted the virus.

The chapter gives a clear illustration of how the adversarial reporting culture of the media impacts negatively on the community and its social fabrics.

But, the chapter’s author, Shameem Reza, communications lecturer at Dhaka University, says that when the second outbreak started in March 2021, he observed a shift in the media coverage of covid-19 pandemic.

Now, the stories are more about harassment and discrimination, such as migrant workers facing hurdles to access vaccine; uncertainty over confirming air tickets and flights for their return; and facing risk of losing jobs and becoming unemployed. Thus, now the media coverage particularly includes ordinary peoples’ suffering.

Reza believes that the initial stigmatisation of victims, had influenced social media coverage of harassment, and “changed agendas in the public sphere”.

Lack of skills, knowledge
The authors argue in the chapter on the Philippines that the covid-19 coverage exposed the “lack of skills and knowledge in reporting on health issues”. Said a senior newspaper editor, “in the past, whenever there were training opportunities on science or health reporting, we’d send the young reporters to give them the chance to go out of the newsroom. Now we know we should have sent editors and senior reporters.”

In the concluding chapter, Seneviratne and Muppidi discuss various social and economic issues that should be the focus of the coverage as the world recovers from the covid-19 pandemic that reflects the inequalities around the world. These include not only vaccine rollouts, but also the vulnerability of migrant labour and their rights, the plight of casual labour in the so-called “gig economy”, priority for investments on health services, the power of Big Tech and many others.

This book is an attempt to raise the voices of the “Global South” in discussing the media’s role in the coverage of the covid-19 crisis, explain Seneviratne and Muppidi, pointing out that there cannot be a return to the “normal” when that is full of inequalities that have been exposed by the pandemic.

“There are many issues that the media should be mindful of in reporting the inevitable recovery from the covid-19 pandemic in 2021 and beyond.”

Krishan Dutta is a freelance journalist writing for IDN – News (In-Depth News). An earlier version of this review was first published by IDN-News under the title “New book explores how adversarial reporting culture drives politicised covid-19 coverage and this version is republished from Pacific Journalism Review.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Facebook has today launched a public education campaign to help people in five Pacific Island countries and territories learn how to identify and combat health-related misinformation.

The locations and languages are Wallis & Futuna (French), New Caledonia (French), Tonga (English and Tongan), Solomon Islands (English and Solomon Islands Pijin), and Cook Islands (English).

The campaign, which follows an earlier launch in Samoa, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, will run for five weeks and includes graphics and videos.

The content is designed to encourage three key behaviours by Facebook users:

• Awareness – Be informed that misinformation exists
• Investigation – Find out more to confirm if the information is indeed false
• Action – Visit the local health authority to get accurate information

Mia Garlick, director of public policy for Australia, New Zealand and Pacific Islands, says: “One of our commitments is to connect people to reliable information, and give people the tools to make informed decisions about the information they see on Facebook.

“We are extending our efforts to reach more people across the Pacific, ensuring they can easily compare what they see with official public health resources.

“We will continue to work with health experts including the World Health Organisation (WHO), and local partners, to make sure that we have the right policies in place to reduce the spread of harmful covid-19 and covid-19 vaccine misinformation on our platform.”

Throughout the pandemic, Facebook has worked closely with WHO to direct people to authoritative covid-19 information, and to do more to identify and take action to remove incorrect claims about the virus.

The campaigns can be found at:
Wallis & Futuna (French)
New Caledonia (French)
Tonga (English)
Tonga (Tongan)
Solomon Islands (English)
Solomon Islands (Solomon Islands Pijin)
Cook Islands (English)

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

An independent panel says Chinese officials could have applied public health measures more forcefully in January to curb the initial covid-19 outbreak, and criticised the World Health Organisation (WHO) for not declaring an international emergency until 30 January.

The experts reviewing the global handling of the pandemic, led by former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark and former Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, called for reforms to the Geneva-based United Nations agency.

Their interim report was published hours after the WHO’s top emergency expert, Dr Mike Ryan, said global deaths from covid-19 were expected to top 100,000 per week “very soon”.

“What is clear to the Panel is that public health measures could have been applied more forcefully by local and national health authorities in China in January,” the report said, referring to the initial outbreak of the new disease in the central city of Wuhan, in Hubei province.

As evidence emerged of human-to-human transmission, “in far too many countries, this signal was ignored”, it added.

Specifically, it questioned why the WHO’s Emergency Committee did not meet until the third week of January and did not declare an international emergency until its second meeting on 30 January.

“Although the term pandemic is neither used nor defined in the International Health Regulations (2005), its use does serve to focus attention on the gravity of a health event. It was not until 11 March that WHO used the term,” the report said.

‘Not fit for purpose’
“The global pandemic alert system is not fit for purpose”, it said. “The World Health Organisation has been underpowered to do the job.”

Under President Donald Trump, the United States has accused the WHO of being “China-centric”, which the agency denies.

European countries led by France and Germany have pushed for addressing the WHO’s shortcomings on funding, governance and legal powers.

The panel called for a “global reset” and said that it would make recommendations in a final report to health ministers from the 194 member states of WHO in May.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

By Max Towle, Worldwatch reporter of RNZ News

The World Health Organisation (WHO) says New Zealand has been world-leading in its response to the covid-19 coronavirus pandemic.

But at the same time, a top official for the organisation is warning against complacency.

Western Pacific incident manager Abdi Mahamud said the WHO had been particularly impressed with how the government had communicated, and how people had observed social restrictions.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – Infections top 3 million – a third in the US

“Our view of New Zealand’s response has been one of the strongest in the world, and there’s a lot that global communities can learn from the response,” he said.

“There are aspects of New Zealand’s response that can be easily replicated in all countries, regardless of geography and resources.”

But in response to the Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s comment that New Zealand has eliminated the virus, Dr Mahamud warned the country must not become complacent.

“Elimination? Every country has a different connotation with [the word], but what we understand is that the prime minister means a reduction in the undetected chain of transmission in the community,” he said.

‘We have to be cautious’
“But we have to be very cautious moving forward so we don’t fall into a sense of ‘we did it’.”

Dr Mahamud said until a safe and effective vaccine was developed, some social distancing requirements must continue.

“We believe in the New Zealand government’s strategy, that is based on science and evidence.”

He said that on May 7, Minister for Health David Clark would appear in the WHO’s weekly videoconference to discuss the challenges New Zealand had faced.

He also urged New Zealand to support Pacific nations, should there be significant outbreaks in those countries.

“We would like to request New Zealand support to other developing countries, particularly the Pacific Islands,” he said.

“There are Pacific nations with limited resources and fragile health systems, so the deployment of senior [health] officers and financial support [would be helpful].”

742 complaints over businesses
RNZ News reports there were 742 complaints of businesses not complying with the rules on the first day of alert level 3, most over the lack of social distancing.

In this afternoon’s Covid-19 media conference, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment and the Ministry for Primary Industries will be following up on the complaints.

In addition, police recorded 104 breaches in the first 18 hours of alert level 3 – of those 21 were prosecutions and 71 were warnings, Ardern said.

She said the rules are in place for a reason and that it only takes one person to potentially affect many.

“We will not hesitate to take firmer measures if required.”

The Health Ministry has revealed there were just two new cases of Covid-19 reported in the past 24 hours.

Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said the two new cases were made up of one confirmed and one probable case.

The total number of confirmed cases is now 1126, with 348 probable cases, for a combined total of 1474. Dr Bloomfield said an earlier probable case had now been reclassified as confirmed.

There have been no further deaths.

Six people are in hospital, but none of them are in intensive care.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

PACIFIC PANDEMIC DIARY: By David Robie, self-isolating in Auckland under New Zealand’s Covid-19 lockdown as part of a Pacific Media Watch series.

Donald Trump’s sabre-rattling freeze on funding for the World Health Organisation at a time when many countries are pulling together for a global response to the coronavirus pandemic has surely earned him the epithet of the “world’s chief covidiot”.

The US President’s efforts at deflecting the blame for his country’s national public health crisis by pointing the finger at WHO and announcing that Washington would pull funding as the largest donor has shocked the world, triggering widespread condemnation from leaders and public health experts.

The impact of this shock decision is bound to be felt in the Pacific region with some countries and territories clinging precariously to their Covid-19-free status, while others – such as the US territory Guam, New Caledonia and French Polynesia – have already become hotspots.

READ MORE: NZ media warn of desperate times ahead

American funding to WHO provided more than 15 percent of the international body’s 2018-19 budget of $4.4 billion.

While Richard Horton, the editor-in-chief of the Lancet medical journal, denounced Trump’s decision as “a crime against humanity” and an “appalling betrayal” of every scientist, health worker and citizen – and of global solidarity, the second largest WHO donor, Microsoft’s Bill Gates of the Gates Foundation, described the move “as dangerous as it sounds”.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says it is “not the time” to cut funding or to question errors.

“Once we have finally turned the page on this epidemic, there must be a time to look back fully to understand how such a disease emerged and spread its devastation so quickly across the globe, and how all those involved reacted to the crisis,” he said.

Three-month review
Rather pointless right now when most countries are in crisis.

Trump ordered the blocking of funds pending a three-month review of WHO’s role in allegedly “severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus”.

The president claimed that the pandemic could have been contained “with very little death” if the UN agency had accurately assessed the situation in China, where the virus outbreak began in the city of Wuhan late last year. He accused of WHO of having put too much faith in Beijing.

However, the US president had in the early stages regularly downplayed the dangers of this virus that has killed more than 128,000 people and infected more than 2 million worldwide, according to figures from Johns Hopkins University.

He had declared it was all “under control” and as late as March 27 praised President Xi Jinping for China’s handling of the crisis. According to Politico, he tweeted or addressed rallies 15 times in praise of China.

The US has now become the hardest hit country with the highest death toll of more than 30,000 and 630,000 confirmed cases.

Ironically, the Johns Hopkins University figures – regarded as the most reliable – have been criticised for obscuring the degree of impact in the US by breaking up US death toll figures into individual state tallies.

Warning signs for PNG
The warning signs are there for countries such as Papua New Guinea which has already drawn alarm signals from Human Rights Watch, saying that a serious outbreak there would be “a catastrophe”. (Just two “cases” so far, one a foreign mineworker who was repatriated back to Australia and the other a woman in East New Britain who turned out to be a false alarm after a provincial lockdown).

“Even before the coronavirus pandemic, the fragile health system in Papua New Guinea was underfunded and overwhelmed, with high rates of malaria, tuberculosis, and diabetes among its population of more than eight million,” wrote an HRW associate director, Georgie Bright.

“Access to hospitals is extremely limited, with 80 percent of the population living outside urban centres. Prime Minister James Marape has acknowledged the country has only 500 doctors, less than 4000 nurses, and around 5000 beds in hospitals and health centres.

“The country reportedly has only 14 ventilators.”

However, Bright also acknowledged that hopefully there might be mitigating factors, such as large sections of its rural population living in remote mountainous villages in the highlands : “It could be that PNG will be spared the scale of the pandemic seen elsewhere such as Wuhan, a dense urban area with a mobile and older population.”

Vanuatu (population almost 300,000) is another country with serious concerns of “disaster” with a possible outbreak, but Fiji (pop. About 900,000) – although it has 19 confirmed cases so far – seems to be holding its own with the success of its fever clinics that have tested more than 120,000 people in the capital of Suva so far.

Timor-Leste is also on the watch list with an eight cases so far and a furore over the sacking of the acting health minister.

Pushed into the background by the relentless sad statistics and doomsday stories around the globe are some other stories in the Pacific that normally struggle to get an airing in mainstream media.

Growing concern for West Papua
Just over the porous 820 km jungle border from Papua New Guinea, are the two Melanesian provinces Papua and West Papua ruled under protest by Indonesia. Collectively known as West Papua, the region has become a growing public health concern as Indonesia appears headed for disaster.

The coronavirus pandemic is “exacerbating tensions” in West Papua and exposing the “shortcomings” of Jakarta government policy, laments a conflict watchdog group.

The Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict (IPAC) says President Joko Widodo’s government needs to urgently appoint a senior official to “focus exclusively on Papua” province to ensure that immediate humanitarian needs and longer term issues are effectively addressed.

It has appealed for greater transparency and more support for the local Papuan administrations in coping with the spread of the virus.

“The virus arrived in Papua as tensions left over from deadly communal violence in August-September 2019 remained high, and pro-independence guerrillas from the Free Papua Organisation (Organisasi Papua Merdeka, OPM) were intensifying attacks in the central highlands.

“Papua’s major faultlines – indigenous vs migrant, central control vs local autonomy, independence movement vs the state – affected both how Papuans interpreted the pandemic and the central government’s response.”

The pandemic has also added new complications such as how many Papuans are “already portraying the virus as being brought in by non-Papuan migrants and the military”. As a result, “hostility and suspicion” are growing.

‘Jakarta six’ episode
Another episode happened in Jakarta this week that ought to have focused attention on the ongoing human rights struggle for Papuans yet was barely noticed in mainstream media in Australia and New Zealand.

A hearing about the trial of six Papuan activists – known as the “Jakarta Six” – will now be held online or long-distance amid the enforcement of large scale social restrictions to contain the coronavirus pandemic.

The accused – five men and a woman – are Paulus Suryanta Ginting, Charles Kossay, Ambrosius Mulait, Isay Wenda, Anes Tabuni and Arina Elopere. They were arrested by police for flying the Morning Star independence flag during a protest action demanding a referendum for Papua in front of the State Palace on August 28 last year.

The hearings into the alleged makar (treason, subversion, rebellion) case have been changed since the coronavirus pandemic has hit Indonesia, particularly in Jakarta.

The team of lawyers defending the six had earlier asked the panel of judges to postpone the hearing. However, the judges refused the request but changed the mechanism for the hearing so that the defendants can remain in jail for the trial.

NZ’s ‘long road back’
Back in New Zealand, the four-week national lockdown has been going encouragingly well, it is into its last week with the debate now moving on to the “long road back” for the economy by relaxing controls – a little – and the manner of how this would be achieved. A decision will be announced next Monday.

The Ministry of Health statistics show just nine deaths so far – mostly elderly rest home patients – with a fairly stable 1386 cases, just 20 new ones announces yesterday that are eclipsed by the rate of recoveries, now up to 728.

The last of 18,000 stranded German and European visitors and tourists seeking repatriation have now returned to their countries. The final Lufthansa Airbus flight had a sole incoming passenger – an Easter Bunny named Jacinda in honour of Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern who has gained admiration for her courageous leadership, clear communication and kindness.

Not to mention the prime minister, her cabinet and civil service managers’ voluntary gesture of a six-month 20 percent pay cut in solidarity with the “struggle that many New Zealanders are facing”.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

By Ardilla Syakriah, Rizki Fachriansyah and Muh. Ibnu Aqil in Jakarta

Indonesia’s first two confirmed Covid-19 coronavirus patients claim that media coverage and discussion on social media have taken a greater toll on them than the disease itself, saying that numerous breaches of privacy and the resulting stigma have left them “mentally drained”.

Some people went so far as to directly attack one of the patients, known as Case 1, through social media.

A message saying “You have been warned by the government to be vigilant of foreigners but you were stubborn” was sent to her over Instagram, a screenshot of which was shown to The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.

READ MORE: Indonesia to test more people for the Covid-19 virus

Earlier, personal details of the two patients comprising their initials, ages and home address popped up on WhatsApp groups and other social media from an unclear source not long after the news about the confirmed cases broke on Monday.

President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo announced that a 31-year-old woman (Case 1) and her 64-year-old mother (Case 2), both residents of Depok, West Java, had tested positive for Covid-19 after coming into contact with a Japanese woman who later tested positive in Malaysia.

The President’s announcement came as a surprise to the patients themselves.

“We had not been [officially told that we had tested positive],” Case 2 told kompas.com on Tuesday.

Patients’ house swarmed
Ever since the announcement, reporters have swarmed the patients’ house. In social media, photographs of the patients also spread like wildfire.

Some internet users questioned the younger patient’s profession, correlating it with how she might have contracted the virus.

Health Minister Terawan Agus Putranto said on Monday that Case 1 was a dance teacher and had danced with the Japanese citizen, whom he described as a close friend of the woman, in a club in Kemang, South Jakarta.

In a statement made on Wednesday, Case 1 shared how she might have contracted the virus and what she did afterward — which differed from the account released by the authorities.

Case 1 said she had started coughing and having a fever on Feb. 16 and decided to visit a private hospital along with her mother last Thursday. There, she was diagnosed with bronchopneumonia and her mother with typhus.

The following day, a friend in Malaysia called to let her know a Japanese woman who had tested positive for Covid-19 on Feb. 26 had visited the restaurant in Jakarta where she had been hosting on Feb. 15.

“For the sake of national security and health, I informed the doctor that I needed to be tested and that’s why I’ve been isolated since Sunday. I don’t even know nor am I acquainted with the Japanese citizen,” she said.

Japanese citizen a woman
She further emphasised the Japanese citizen was a woman, not a man who “rented” her like the gossip said. “I was just in a room with the Japanese woman without knowing who she was.”

“Please respect me and my family’s privacy, stop spreading our photos and fake news about us,” she said in a statement.

The breach of the patients’ personal data also affected their neighbours. Anis Hidayah of Migrant Care, one of the neighbours, said media coverage had disrupted their activities: some were not allowed by their employers to work and app-based motorcycle taxi drivers were adamant about not accepting orders from the housing complex.

“What I regret the most is it has framed people I know personally in unfavorable ways,” Hidayah said.

Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy researcher Wahyudi Djafar said the recent case of privacy breach was due to the absence of legislation on personal data protection and the lack of respect for privacy in society.

Unlike Singapore with its 2012 Data Protection Act, Indonesia has no specific law stipulating what makes data private, the rights of data owners, the duties of the data processors, or the mechanisms for processing such data.

“Even if some laws regulate about privacy, the material is limited and often contradictory because they don’t follow the same principle of personal data protection,” he said.

Data protection bill
He urged that a data protection bill be discussed, although he warned the public to keep an eye on the deliberations as there was potential for abuse of power in the current draft. The draft only imposes administrative sanctions on the government for possible wrongdoing.

Jokowi requested people respect the Covid-19 patients’ privacy following his announcement. He also asked that his ministers and the hospitals involved in treating the patients avoid disclosing the patients’ private information.

In a statement issued on Monday, the Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI) called on members of the press to be more considerate in their reporting by speaking to the most credible sources on the issue, as opposed to publishing “sensationalised” pieces on the patients and their families.

Lawmaker Charles Honoris has urged the government to ensure the privacy of its citizens in relation to the spread of the coronavirus.

“Mass disclosure of Covid-19 patients’ private information should be taken seriously as a violation of citizens’ privacy,” he said.

He said the government must learn from Singapore and Japan in this regard, specifically about how the two countries had implemented a zero-tolerance privacy policy to protect the personal lives of its confirmed Covid-19 patients.

The writers are staff reporters of The Jakarta Post.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz