Into the shocked, shucked shell of the hospital at Kunduz, which
for ten days past, in streaming light (the season’s slant of sun), has spilled
a steaming trail of twisted bricks, chewed up rails, a grieving mist – the site
where the counted, cradled sick burned up, the still un-
bordered doctors tell, in beds the red-blue bombers targeted
and turned to smoking tar – into the murdered spectacle,
a spangled, metal beast, a tank, has since arrived, to crinkle
underneath its feet the very residues of war,
a mounting dust-heap mingled in its wake, whose quiet particles
now drift and sway, dissolving in the blue –
as the learned pugilographer appears in print, enrobed
in points of lucidation, the buff and cleanly Michael Newton,
who, pending Pentagon investigation, will clarify
the one un-
answered question thrice
for all concerned: Who had control, that day,
of base-defensive protocols? Why include
a hospital among the targets pre-approved?
And what, he wonders, happened on the ground?
Feature Image: Kabul, Afghanistan. 5th Nov, 2015. The damaged sign of the Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) hospital in Kunduz is displayed at a press conference in Kabul, Afghanistan, 5 November 2015. A month after the US airstrike on the Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, the aid organisation has repeated calls for an inquiry. PHOTO: MOHAMMAD JAWAD/DPA/Alamy Live News.
Continuing tensions in Greece over that State’s handling of the refugee crisis contradicts a carefully constructed public image the ruling right wing Nea Demokrita (New Democracy) wishes to project to a domestic and international audience. The issue of illegal ‘push-backs’ of migrants has continued to generate outrage, controversy, and outright denial in European media. This contradictory policy is reflected in events over this past week, as an attempt by the Greek President to honour a noted refugee-rescuer resulted in swift push-back by members of the ruling party keen to downplay such defiant gestures.
Technically head of state – although her role is primarily ceremonial – Greece’s first female President Katerina Sakellaropoulou had issued a list of Greek citizens who were to be honoured for their contribution to society in various fields. The conferral ceremony was part of a wider series of events held last weekend commemorating the forty-seventh anniversary of the restoration of Greek Democracy.
Those chosen to be honoured were drawn from various fields, including academia, medicine, and the arts. Amongst them was activist Iasonas Apostolopoulos, who over several years has been working as a sea rescuer of refugees around the Mediterranean Sea. Currently working with Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors without Borders) on such missions, Apostolopoulos has previously received honors for his humanitarian actions from the Mayor of Palermo, and the Danish Navy.
He was invited to attend the ceremony on Saturday 24th of July at the Presidential Hall. According to his testimony, however, he received a phone call from the Ministry of the Exterior on Friday 23rd July – after midnight – informing him he would not be decorated after all. Not only was this a highly unusual turn of events, but Apostolopolous had already been publically named as a recipient of this public honour. The cancellation was bound to stir controversy.
Worryingly, hours before Apostolopoulos had been informed by phone news of the cancellation was leaked on Twitter and Facebook by Konstantinos Bogdanos, a member of parliament from the ruling party of Nea Dimokratia (New Democracy). In his post, Bogdanos described the refugee rescuer as an ‘aggressive critic of the border policy and our security corps,’ and attached social media posts of Apostolopoulos critical of the well-documented illegal push backs by the Greek authorities, which have been linked to refugees drowning at sea.
The process of “pushing back” is designed to prevent migrants from arriving in a jurisdiction, or immediately returning them once they have arrived there. It prevents asylum seekers from declaring themselves as such, from presenting papers or other documents to the authorities, or even from receiving basic first aid or other essentials such as food, medicine and drinking water.
The practice has become all too commonplace as ‘Fortress Europe’ attempts to prevent and discourage the movement of victims of war and its economic consequences, and, increasingly, climate change.
Mediterranean countries such as Greece and Italy justifiably claim the burden of dealing with the refugee crisis has fallen disproportionately on them, a situation exacerbated by the regulations surrounding the Dublin Protocol and the increasing militarization of Frontex, the European Border Patrol Agency.
This burden has also fallen on non-EU Turkey, which is commonly believed to be foisting refugees onto their Greek neighbours, who in turn are forcing these unfortunate travellers back into the jurisdiction of the Turkish Coast Guard. The fear, frustration and terror suffered by those on the receiving end of these often fatal tactics is unimaginable.
Pushback by Greek security forces has received wide attention in the international media, and a recent Oxfam report from June 2021 described the practice of pushbacks at the Greek border are ‘persistent and systematic’.
Nonetheless, Minister of Migration and Asylum, Notis Mitarachi, has claimed that these allegations are ‘clearly unfounded’, despite eyewitness testimony, mobile phone footage from on board migrant vessels being attacked, and the testimony of the Turkish Coast Guard and other authorities. The practice was also thoroughly investigated in a recent New York Timesarticle, less than a week before Apostolopoulos was defamed as a traitor to his country.
The influential journalist Elena Akrita attended the ceremony. The following Sunday, she posted her response on her Facebook page: ‘What is 100% cross referenced is that the entire Far Right section of Nea Dimokratia fell on top the issue. They riled up a big fuss and managed to take his name off the list.’
The affair has brought a wave of outrage on social media, and is bound to reach the chambers of Parliament over the coming days and weeks, as left wing parties SYRIZA and MERA25, have already issued statement demanding explanations.
To some extent Apostolopoulos’s exclusion has backfired on those behind it, as it has brought the issue of illegal pushbacks of refugees back into Greek public discourse, and indeed the wider world.
The plight of refugees seems to be forgotten by those justifying the tactic of preventing safely landings on Greek territories such as Lesbos.
In reponse to this controversy, Iason Apostolopoulos made the following statement to independent mediaThe Press Project:
Unfortunately, I don’t have a lot of time to deal with whatever is going on in Greece. At the moment I am in the central Mediterranean Sea on board the rescue boat Geo Barents, of Doctors Without Borders. Our priorities here are different. Since the 2nd of July, we are pinned down by Italian maritime police in Augusta port, they won’t let us sail, we can’t even come ashore and they keep us anchored. A few miles away, hundreds of people every day struggle for the lives on decrepit blow up boats, facing the waves but also the utter indifference of European authorities.
Any people who manage to survive, are returned to the slave markets and torture centers of Libya, in joint operations of Frontex and Libyan Navy.
This is the reality that we are experiencing and whoever doesn’t want us to talk about it, is covering up and essentially supporting a European border regime which everyday produces mass death, violence and misery.
The debate over the tactics the EU is using to discourage migrants from attempting to reach its borders will continue. In the meantime, activists like Apostolopoulos can expect varying levels of opposition from state actors. Events in Greece this past week have shown how deep the divisions are between those seeking humanitarian solutions and those seeking complete control of the narrative around the refugee crisis.
The palpable relief being felt by many over the accelerating approvals of apparently safe and efficient Covid-19 vaccines is hardly surprising. But away from triumphalist headlines, partially satiric messages have circulated widely on social media essentially stating: “I can’t wait for a new vaccine to come out so I can refuse it.”
These are easy to dismiss as frivolous, or the ravings of an unhinged libertarian fringe, but such statements also evoke a frequent paradox in Western societies; namely calls for scientific breakthroughs to benefit the health of all, while maintaining a scepticism about public health measures enacted by governments and reliant on a mercantilist pharmaceutical industry. And more ominously, concerns over anti-vaccination lobbying distract from life and death issues surrounding equitable vaccine access for a large portion of humanity.
Edward Jenner 1749-1823.
Pitfalls of the Public Good
Heralded as a milestone among Enlightenment advances, Edward Jenner’s late 18th century inoculation of his gardener’s son with cowpox is a path well-trodden by medical historians. In attempting to provoke an immune reaction to the far more dangerous smallpox virus, this precursor to modern vaccination built on centuries of traditional practices, notably in Africa, the Middle East and East Asia.
By subsequently infecting his test subject with live variolous matter to prove his point, Jenner likewise carried on a long tradition of dubious experimentation. Despite minimal understanding of disease transmission – let along virology – vaccine development has consistently provoked opposition, whether political, philosophical, spiritual, or from scientists themselves.
A significant factor in the dramatic European demographic expansion over the course of the 19th century was the spread of smallpox vaccination. There is a reasonable corollary between the broadening of States’ responsibilities over health matters and the emergence of openly anti-vaccine movements. Both processes accelerated during the Pasteur-Koch era even as the array of infectious diseases that were understood and potentially preventable expanded.
Uncertainty and disbelief shifted to the questioning of the basic premise of vaccination, manufacturing conditions, and even the means of prescription to a population. More familiar incarnations include arguments over the presence of aluminium adjuvants; discredited studies pointing to the occurrence of autistic disorders; the possible corruption of decision-makers for the benefit of laboratories; or a broader discordance between the interests of the pharmaceutical industry and those of public health.
A succession of scandals led Ben Goldacre in Bad Pharma: How drug companies mislead doctors and harm patients (Fourth Estate, London, 2012) to write: “I think it’s fair to say that anti-vaccine conspiracy theories are a kind of poetic response to the obvious regulatory failure in medicine and in the pharmaceutical industry. People know that there is something a little bit wrong here.”
Far from being solely a European issue, health coercion, including the authoritarian imposition of mass vaccination, has unsurprisingly manifested itself in colonial history. A highly toxic plague vaccine developed in India was tested on prisoners (along with the microbiologist responsible for its discovery), before being made obligatory for Chinese residents of San Francisco during an outbreak of Bubonic plague in turn-of-the-century San Francisco.
An 1886 advertisement for ‘Magic Washer’ detergent: ‘The Chinese Must Go’.
Attempts to tackle African sleeping sickness are similarly striking. The example of pentamidine in the 1940s, an antibiotic which was believed to treat sleeping sickness (ten million preventive injections would prove as useless as they were dangerous), highlighted not only the irrationality of colonial policies in place at the time, but also a blind faith in scientific progress. Public health policies could indeed seem far removed from what was being referred to as the common good.
Past failings and Understandable Reservations
Vaccines have since become a highly symbolic element of the State’s power over the human body, with objections today frequently based on claims of infringement on individual liberties. But while the dismissal of scientific evidence is disturbing in and of itself a far more sinister side exists, the assassination of health workers administering polio vaccines in Pakistan being an obvious example.
As opposed to a demonstration in national power it is rather a question of a State failing in its responsibilities, be it through limited health infrastructure or outright negligence. And the CIA’s fake Hepatitis B vaccination campaign used to determine the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden in 2011 has hardly reassured those living in areas beyond the government’s remit. Rather, long-standing doubts about the motives behind mass vaccinations have been reinforced.
Delta Force GIs disguised as Afghan civilians, while they searched for bin Laden in November 2001
A comparable incredulity can be observed at present in Europe, where compliance with health measures taken by various States to fight the Covid-19 pandemic remains closely linked to the trust of populations in their respective governments – a trust that has unfortunately long since been waning in many societies. Hopes in scientific research for the health of the greatest number of people is confronted with the reality of a mercantilist pharmaceutical industry, or even the possible instrumentalization of public health by certain opportunistic governments to suppress pre-existing social discontent. All amidst a backdrop of wider deteriorating democratic norms and respect for basic human rights.
Debate, or Lack Thereof
While it is undeniable that an army of researchers was required to secure a Covid-19 vaccine, a cynic would question the speed with which pharmaceutical companies have developed a serum for a large and clearly solvent market, while many diseases remain outside the agendas of these laboratories. The legitimacy of a vaccine passport can also be challenged, not only because its medical effectiveness is still questioned by many, but also because it could prove a powerful deterrent to migratory phenomena and the right to asylum. The well-intentioned rush to digital health could unfortunately prove to be an additional obstacle for many countries for which access to Covid-19 vaccination may be late or even logistically impossible in view of refrigeration requirements.
If there is one matter on which there should be a consensus among populations, it is that of equitable access to these new therapies, especially given the infusion of public funds to finance the research. In particular, the terms of agreements between laboratories on the operation and licensing of Covid-19 vaccines should be made public and openly debated.
Whether or not one is convinced of the merits of vaccinating at this time against this particular virus; whether or not one questions the way this pandemic has been managed by our respective governments; and whether or not one criticises the manufacturing conditions of the serums, it would seem deeply naive to leave in the hands of competing economic powers one of the essential pillars of any society: the possibility of preserving the health of the greatest number of people. The history of vaccination, despite all the missteps and at times understandable reservations, provides an apt demonstration of this goal.
Featured Image: World Health Organization photo by D. Henrioudpreparing for production of measles vaccine.
The authors are researchers with the Research Unit on Humanitarian Stakes and Practices, Médecins Sans Frontières – Switzerland. The views expressed in this article are theirs and in no way represent the organization to which they belong.
As Covid-19 sweeps through Ireland, I can’t help experiencing a feeling of déjà vu. In early 2015, I was based in Guinea as part of the international response to the Ebola epidemic ravaging west Africa. I was responsible for reporting on the progress of the epidemic as well as the measures being applied to halt its further progression. An important element of my work was in helping define the potential recovery needs of the country and articulating a vision as to how the international agency I was working for could contribute in helping Guinea transition from the ongoing short-term emergency humanitarian focus to a middle-long term recovery and development operational approach.
Conakry in the Time of Ebola
Prior to travelling to Guinea, I had read everything I could find both about Ebola and the situation on the ground. Similar to Covid-19, Ebola is a virus and is also believed to originate from bats. However, it is far more virulent, can result in serious haemorrhaging with severe internal and external bleeding and has a far higher death rate.[i]The first Ebola case in west Africa occurred in late December 2013 in Guinea. A 2 year-old boy in the village of Melandiou, close to the Guinean border with Liberia and Sierra Leone feel ill with a mysterious disease, later identified as Ebola and died a couple of days later.[ii] His grandmother, pregnant mother and three year old sister died shortly after.[iii] Ebola was on the march.
In the latter half of 2014 and early 2015, the media was full of apocalyptic descriptions and assessments of the impacts of Ebola on Guinea, as well as its neighbours Liberia and Sierra Leone, and the danger of its spreading further afield. However, the situation on the ground in Conakry which greeted me upon my arrival, was not at all what I had expected. If I had not been aware of the virulence and mortality rate of those who contracted Ebola, I could easily have been convinced that its threat had been seriously over-hyped.
While hand sanitisers were omnipresent and my temperature was taken each time upon arrival at the office, as well as when visiting other organisations, there appeared to be little restriction on the movement of people in Conakry. There was an abundance of economic activity as people moved freely through the streets and the colourful markets heavied with custom. Street food vendors displayed and sold their succulent delicacies to eager passers-by. Aspiring footballers practised their skills on the open roads, briefly making way for passing traffic, while others jogged through the streets. One bridge I passed, several times a day, had a perpetual presence of primarily young men performing their workouts and practising stretches from early in the morning until late evening. A sofa conveniently placed at the end of the street, where our office was located, had been drafted into service as a temporary meeting place for an ever-changing guard of young males.
Conakry in the time of Ebola. (c) Justin Frewen
The absence of constraints on physical proximity was particularly evident during the finals of the African football Cup, for which Guinea had qualified after a long absence. In the days leading up to the tournament, a tangible thrill of expectation hung in the air as pockets of people congressed in the streets and cafes to assess their country’s chances. The day of the tournament launch, a pair of enormous speakers were placed in the street behind our office. From 8 AM onwards, music blasted through the neighbourhood. From my vantage point on the second floor, I could see boys and girls dancing in their gardens and passers-by congregating to animatedly discuss the imminent tournament kick-off. A middle-aged woman walked down the street laden with two substantial shopping bags. As she neared the source of the pulsating beat, a broad smile flickered across her pleasant features as she swayed to the rhythm without missing a stride. Some 20 metres later, she resumed her erstwhile gait and homeward struggle with her sagging shopping bags.
International Women’s Day, Conakry,, Guinea, Justin Frewen.
Coronavirus Lockdowns
In contrast, the current coronavirus pandemic has led to lockdowns of varying intensities around the world. As early as 24 March, the Guardian newspaper highlighted how some 20% of the world’s population was under lockdown imposed as a result of Covid-19.[iv] The past month, if anything, has seen a radical increase in the imposition of such measures and the consequent reduction of social and economic activities to prevent the onward transmission of this virus. This contrasts sharply with the general situation in Guinea during the Ebola crisis. Although strict quarantine was imposed on those who contracted Ebola and in spite of the lurid accounts of Ebola’s impact upon the people of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, there was paradoxically far less overt evidence of its threat in daily, public life.
The primary reason for this difference lies in the transmissibility of the respective viruses that lead to Ebola and Covid-19. As outlined by ‘Médecins sans frontières’ (MSF – Doctors Without Borders), who were instrumental in rallying international awareness and required resources to tackle Ebola, “(H)uman to human transmission occurs through contact with bodily fluids of an infected person or through surfaces contaminated with these fluids.”[v] Covid-19, like other common human coronaviruses, transmits from an infected person a) in water droplets through the air, as a result of coughing or sneezing; b) close personal contact such as shaking hands; and c) touching one’s face (eyes, nose, mouth) after touching an object / surface before washing one’s hands.[vi]
It is therefore clear the potential onward transmission of Covid-19 is far greater than for Ebola, as it does not require direct physical contact with the carrier of the virus. Fortunately, it appears that it cannot be transmitted through the air directly which would greatly increase its range and ease of transmission.[vii] This fact has led to a far greater restriction on social and economic life due to Covid-19’s enhanced transmissibility that was the case with Ebola.
Virus Mobility
Ebola’s infection spread was relatively localised. Despite the occurrence of a few cases outside the epicentre of west Africa (Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia), such as in Scotland and North America predominantly via the return of health workers, the virus was effectively contained. Approximately 11,000 people succumbed to the illness and while each of these fatalities was a tragedy for the victims and their loved ones, this figure obviously pales in significance to the rapidly increasing daily totals of Covid-19. As I write today, on 24 April, the recorded deaths are fast approaching 200,000. These figures, however, are undoubtedly a significant underestimation of the actual number of people who have succumbed directly to this coronavirus, not to mention those who may have succumbed to secondary infections due to enfeebled immune systems. In the UK, for example, the daily figures of deaths released to the public do not include those that have occurred in nursing homes or other residential settings.[viii]
One of the major issues confronting health personnel combating Ebola in Guinea was the mobility of people in this region as there was widescale migration by people particularly in the rural areas to obtain income for their families. This situation was aggravated by the porous frontiers between neighbouring countries as people would often traverse national borders in search of work and food or even simply to visit their extended family. Borders in Africa have frequently been subject of fierce contestation and the manner in which they were imposed during colonialism has been one of its most enduring, negative legacies. They have both divided members of ethnic groups, as in the case of the nomadic Tuareg of North Africa, and also forced members of diverse cultural and religious groups into a single polity, such as the Sudan or Nigeria.
In tackling Ebola, it became clear that the presence of these different national jurisdictions, divided by arbitrary and highly porous borders, such as those that existed between Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia greatly complicated the tracing of potential contacts of Ebola victims. Frequently, there would be no accurate records of who had crossed from one country to its neighbour. During the Ebola epidemic this resulted in severe delays in tracing potential contacts of Ebola victims, with the potential that these contacts could inadvertently become the source of waves of new infections as they moved from one place to the next.
While Ebola was spread in west Africa predominantly through the movement of local people in rural areas trying to augment their meagre incomes, the worldwide dissemination of Covid-19 has been by the more relatively globally affluent. The massive growth in air travel has greatly increased the ease by which viruses can move from one part of the globe to another via their human hosts. When the Spanish Flu, so named because the flu was first widely reported on there, global movement was far slower and it therefore took the virus far longer to journey from one region to another. Today, we can get to virtually anywhere in the world in under 36 hours. This makes it far more difficult to control the onward progression of viruses such as Covid-19 and to effectively localise their impact, as was the case with Ebola.[ix] It should be noted that this risk had been noted as an issue of concern prior to the current pandemic.[x]
‘The massive growth in air travel has greatly increased the ease by which viruses can move’
Fear and ‘loathing’
A frequent occurrence in serious epidemics and pandemics is the parallel transmission of fear which can radiate through impacted communities, even amongst those not yet exposed to the pathogen. A particularly tragic episode during the Ebola crisis occurred in September 2014 in the southern Guinea village of Wome when a team of eight health workers and journalists were murdered. The villagers were terrified that this deputation, which had been sent to help there and fearing they were there to spread the disease, attacked them violently with clubs and machetes.
Although unique in terms of loss of life, the tragedy at Wome was not an isolated event. The Red Cross reported that its teams were attacked an average of 10 times per month over a year by frightened members of the local population.[xi] While there was a degree of understanding amongst member of the international community in Guinea as to the apprehension of local people confronted by outsiders, particularly those decked out in full hazmat suits, there was also disbelief that this could result in such aggression. Outside Guinea, people generally express incredulity at what transpired at Wome. How could people be so ill informed or be in such a state of fear that they would murder those sent to provide assistance. This would surely never happen in ‘developed countries’.
However, if there is one thing we have learnt from Covid-19, it is that the people of Wome were in no way exceptional in falling victim to the plague of fake rumours, conspiracy theories or the negative treatment of health personnel.
Over the Easter weekend in England, numerous phone masts were set on fire amid claims they were spreading the coronavirus. In the early hours of April 14 in Huddersfield, dozens of people had to be evacuated from their homes as a nearby phone mast was set ablaze.[xii] Similar fires were also reported earlier in April at masts in Birmingham, Liverpool and Melling in Merseyside. A video was shared on Facebook and YouTube, allegedly documenting a fire in Aigburth while claiming a link between Covid-19 and mobile technology.[xiii]
One such attack also impacted directly upon the victims of coronavirus when, in Birmingham, a phone mast serving the NHS Nightingale Hospital was targeted by arsonists.[xiv] Mobile masts have also been set alight in Ireland with the latest incident occurring in Cork on the night of 22 April.[xv] Rumours linking Covid-19 and 5G technology have been spread by social media sites such as Facebook, YouTube and WhatsApp, leading to questions as to whether greater control should be exercised over these media to which their providers have responded by deleting what they categorise as false or harmful content related to the virus.[xvi] Intriguingly, there have been reports that social media has also been used in some places to name and shame people breaking social movement restrictions in their communities.[xvii]
There has been deserved widespread praise for those on the frontline of the fight against Covid-19, including nightly clapping by the general public to display their support of health workers. Starting in Italy and Spain, this tribute has spread to many countries around the world. Despite these public accolades, health professionals have been abused in public on account of their engagement in tackling coronavirus. While these incidents have not resulted in fatalities, as in Guinea, they have been extremely disturbing. In early April, Howard Catton, CEO of the International Council of Nurses, revealed his organisation had received reports from around the world of abuse and harassment related to their work in fighting Covid-19. According to Catton, nurses were seen as potential carriers of the virus and thus a threat to the communities in which they lived.[xviii] In England, nurses have been abused in public and accused of being disease spreaders.[xix] Heath personnel have even been forced to quit their accommodation by landlords afraid they may contract the virus from them. In one such instance, Joseph Alsousou, a surgeon based in Oxford was asked to leave his rented accommodation as soon as possible.[xx]
Health Care workers.
From Ebola to Covid-19: Has the WHO Failed Again?
The WHO came under severe criticism for its handling of the Ebola epidemic. The international president of Médicins Sans Frontieres (MSF), Joanne Liu, appeared before the UN Security Council in September 2014 to inform the members directly as to how Ebola was impacting upon west Africa. She revealed that MSF was effectively engaged in building “crematoria instead of hospitals”. The same month Liu demanded that UN members deploy civilian and military resources to tackle this emergency.[xxi]
Following the successful containment of the Ebola outbreak, the WHO apologised for its failure to respond in time and promised to undertake the necessary reforms to avoid a similar situation in the future. However, less than five years later, the WHO is once again under attack for its alleged slowness to respond to the outbreak of Covid-19 and its delay in communicating the gravity of this outbreak to the world at large. To punish the WHO the U.S. President Donald Trump has announced he will withhold the U.S. contribution of US$400 million to the WHO.[xxii] Although some commentators have pointed out that in fact the figure of $400 million is an overestimation given that the U.S. is already as much as $200 million behind in its pledged contributions,[xxiii] this has the potential to seriously disrupt WHO operations at this critical moment.
In effect, while there are understandable concerns that the WHO could have reacted more promptly and effectively to the outbreak of Covid-19, this is not the time to engage in such an analysis. As its Director-General has stated the WHO’s performance in tackling this pandemic will be reviewed both by member states and independent bodies to identify failures in the organisation’s performance.[xxiv] The ongoing underfunding of the WHO together with the organizations endemic internal problems, which predated this crisis, will hopefully feature in this review.[xxv]
WHO Headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland.
Clear Communication
As illustrated in contexts as diverse as New Zealand and Kerala, successfully tackling Covid-19 requires a communications strategy that provides clear guidelines and recommendations, supported by transparent explanations as to the approach adopted through easily accessible media platforms. In Kerala, the state government provided detailed media briefings on a daily basis outlining the necessary actions to tackle the virus, the importance of contact tracing, the need for quarantining and training for healthcare and hospital personal while also seeking the support and cooperation of the general public in surveillance and containment.[xxvi] These daily briefings proved highly popular and earned widespread public respect for the manner in which decisions and their rationale were explained. Updates on government actions to tackle the virus, relayed through the Chief Minister’s social media accounts, also proved highly popular. The effectiveness and accessibility of these communication measures resulted in a statewide awareness of Covid-19 and the necessity for close cooperation and mutual support between the health service and public to reduce transmissibility and avoid clinical case overload.[xxvii]
In addition to providing Covid-19 related information through standard media channels, the NZ Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, has communicated directly with the public, making herself available to the media and holding daily public press conferences, led by New Zealand’s director-general of health, Dr Ashley Bloomfield. Together they have displayed “a reliable, measured and authoritative face for New Zealand’s Covid-19 response”. [xxviii] Of particular value has been the clarity of Jacinda Ardern’s communication on the virus.[xxix] Her leadership style has been assessed by one commentator as “one of empathy in a crisis that tempts people to fend for themselves. Her messages are clear, consistent, and somehow simultaneously sobering and soothing. And her approach isn’t just resonating with her people on an emotional level. It is also working remarkably well.”[xxx]
Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand’s Prime Minister.
Uncharted Territory?
One of the primary excuses offered for the difficulty in responding to Covid-19, has been that it is unprecedented and there is no reliable roadmap to guide us. However, while the current situation whereby so many countries have implemented lockdowns of varying levels of severity, closing down large sectors of their economies, is unique, it would be false to argue that we had no warning of the possibility of such an event.
The first two decades of this millennium has been witness to several new epidemics, that could potentially have had a similar, if not far worse, outcome than Covid-19. Two of these were also coronaviruses, namely Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS). In 2002, SARS originated in Hong Kong, resulting in 8,098 reported cases and 774 deaths, a mortality rate of just under 10%.[xxxi]Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) was first identified in Saudi Arabia in 2012 and spread to several countries. By the end of November 2019 some 34.4% of patients infected by MERS-Cov had died (858 of 2,494 laboratory confirmed cases).[xxxii] In 2014, Ebola first struck west Africa. Although mainly contained to Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, there were a number of cases in other countries. In 2018, another outbreak of Ebola occurred in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the 10th in 40 years. As of 19 April 2020, there had been 3,316 confirmed cases, resulting in 2,277 deaths or a mortality rate of almost 69%.[xxxiii]
Many warnings have also been given by experts that a significant threat of a pandemic existed.[xxxiv] There has been at the very least an awareness that the threat of a pandemic which could result in significant fatalities and international disruption existed. Several countries had undertaken simulations that pointed out where major risks lay in terms of their readiness to counter such a threat. The US alone has held several of these exercises since the turn of the century, which had pointed out severe deficiencies in its preparedness.[xxxv]
Kerala – a model to tackle Covid-19?
The southern Indian state of Kerala which has been widely praised for its response to Covid-19. Its success would appear to be based upon two major elements. The first was the speed with which the state reacted to its outbreak in Wuhan. The health minister, K. K. Shailaja, alarmed by news of the virus in China and aware many students from Kerala were studying in Wuhan, organised a high-level meeting to discuss the situation on January 25th. The following day a control room was established to coordinate the department’s work. Eighteen committees were established and held daily meetings to evaluate actions undertaken and host daily conferences where Shailaja briefed on the actions her department was undertaking. The slogan “Break the Chain” has been given to the approach adopted in Kerala where open quote contact tracing” is implemented. This involves tracing all who have potentially been in contact with the infected person, similar to that approach which was critical in tackling Ebola.
By March 19, Kerala had 25 people who had tested positive and 31,173 people under surveillance, of which 273 were isolated in hospitals with the rest quarantining at home. These high numbers were mainly due to the high influx of travellers, including people from Kerala returning home. On March 18 and 19 alone, 7,861 and 6,103 people respectively were put under surveillance. The resources required, both in terms of management and coordination as well as the active input of all sectors of society, leads to the second reason why Kerala has proved so successful to date in its struggle against Covid-19.
The second critical element in Kerala’s approach is the existence of a strongly supported and well-funded public health sector, which forms a strong health shield against epidemics and other threats, even in a state which would be relatively poor compared with Europe and the U.S. This has been greatly supported by the active participation of a strong grassroots section of the state’s public which has combined with the health service to fight Covid-19.[xxxvi]
When one contrasts the resolute measures, large scale mobilisation and effective containment of Covid-19 by a state such as Kerala or a nation like Vietnam – a country of over 96 million people, which despite sharing a border with China had only 268 cases and no fatalities as of 24 April – one cannot but be impressed at their performance. By the same token, one has to question how these relatively resource poor polities have been able to handle this crisis so much better, at least up to now, than the affluent nations in Europe and the U.S..
The Indian state of Kerala has been widely praised for its response.
What Lies Ahead?
While it is difficult, at this stage, to estimate with any certainty the actual mortality rate of this coronavirus, it is certainly far less lethal than Ebola. Although Covid-19 discriminates greatly against the elderly in our society, its mortality rate is probably inferior to 1% and is likely to be less than this. However, whether we will ever be able to effectively assess the actual number of Covid-19 cases and related deaths is itself a moot point given the wildly varying rates of testing for the virus in different countries, the differing methods for compiling statistics related to deaths and the fact that almost certainly many deaths that occur as a result of this virus will never be acknowledged.
Moreover, there is still much we do not know about this coronavirus. For example, do those who contract and survive Covid-19 gain immunity and, if so, would this be short or long-term? In South Korea, people who appeared to have recovered have later tested positive again for the virus, though preliminary Indications are that rather than being reinfected, the virus has been reactivated.[xxxvii] Similarly in China, patients who had apparently recovered from the virus are still registering as positive without displaying any symptoms. One 50-year-old man was still testing positive some two months after he first acquired Covid-19.[xxxviii] Given the complexities of and uncertainties related to Covid-19, the current phase consisting of lockdowns and other physical isolation measures may yet prove the easier part of our struggle to return to normality.
If the virus can remain dormant in our system with the possibility of being reactivated and/or being transmitted onwards, the struggle to eradicate Covid-19 becomes infinitely more complex. Either coronavirus victims who continue to test positive, despite not displaying any symptoms, might require extended periods of isolation until they are no longer considered potential vectors of onward transmission or there is an approved vaccine in place. The earliest estimate for such a vaccine, despite acceleration of the testing process worldwide, is mid-2021. However, we need to remember there are still no vaccines for the four coronaviruses, including SARS and MERS, that currently circulate amongst humans.[xxxix]
Certainly, the spread of Covid-19 has been far more extensive than Ebola. However, its transmission rate is only one of the issues facing us today. Just as certain underlying health conditions – cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, high blood pressure – can severely aggravate the impact of coronavirus, this coronavirus could have widespread knock-on effects even more deleterious than its health impact. Covid-19 could become an underlying condition, which will lead to serious economic and social disruption as a result of measures applied to counter its spread. We have even been warned that we could face a worse depression that that which provoked by the Wall Street crash of 1929.[xl]
A further significant area of concern is that of food supply. Although supermarket shelves in the global North, despite earlier panic buying, have been kept sufficiently stocked for our immediate needs, this may not last. Should this pandemic continue for an extended period of time, food supply chains will almost certainly be weakened, if not effectively broken. Food chains are complex structures, composed of intricate, interlinked and interrelated elements – agricultural producers and inputs, large brokerage agencies, shipping and land transport companies and distribution nodes, which are all subject to potential disruption. According to the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), reported shipping industry slowdowns due to foreclosures and logistic blockages could soon start to disrupt this chain.[xli] The consequences for the Global South could be catastrophic with potentially hundreds of millions threatened by food insecurity.[xlii]
[iii] Dr. Jonathan D. Quick, The End of Epidemics: The Looming Threat to Humanity and How to Stop it, Scribe Publications, Brunswick (Victoria) Australia / London U.K., p. 27
In December 1899 Honolulu-based physicians attributed two deaths to bubonic plague, and a local paper duly announced that the ‘scourge of the Orient’ had arrived.[i] Within months a first plague fatality was reported in continental U.S. as Chinese-American Chick Gin (Wing Chung Ging or Wong Chut King depending on the transliteration) succumbed to the disease in San Francisco. The cause of death was based on a classic plague symptom of swelling around the groin, but was disputed even after rudimentary bacterial analysis. Regardless, political and health authorities were already taking actions that resonate today.
Fearing the economic impact of a dreaded disease, the state governor denied the existence of plague altogether, accusing his own health officials of propagating rumours and ‘injurious opinions’ detrimental to the ‘great and healthful city.’[ii] Conversely, successive quarantines had already been imposed on San Francisco’s Chinatown, excluding non-Asian homes and businesses despite their proximity. Enforced by barbed wire and a heavy police presence, the blockade led to dwindling food supplies and a steep rise in costs. An experimental vaccine with severe side effects, developed in 1897 by bacteriologist Waldemar Haffkine, was made obligatory for any Chinese (and Japanese) wanting to leave the city.
In 1900, Honolulu’s Chinatown was set on fire to in a misdirected effort to control Bubonic plague.
Unsurprisingly, the turn-of-the-century scapegoating of East Asians in California did not occur in a vacuum. Anti-Chinese prejudice had already been formalized in the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, banning their immigration for undermining the ‘dignity and wage scale of American workers.’[iii] There were, likewise, widespread perceptions of the Chinese as carriers of disease. If Europeans had been imperilled by the ‘barbaric hordes of Asia’, germs represented ‘a peaceful invasion more dangerous than a warlike attack.’[iv] And while dogma of the day suggested limited danger to the West due to advances in health and civilization, extreme measures might be necessary with plague. In such cases Russia’s ‘heroic methods’ in its Chinese colonies were helpfully referenced, as firing squads for the infected ‘saved trouble and other people’s lives.’[v]
An 1886 advertisement for ‘Magic Washer’ detergent: ‘The Chinese Must Go’.
Old Wine, New Bottle
Associating disease with marginalized groups, minorities and others has hardly been an exclusively American experience. And by today’s standards, persecution over illness is not necessarily as crude, but neither can toxic discourse or indeed violence be excluded. The arrival of a new coronavirus in December 2019 is a case in point. The linking of its presumed place of origin in Wuhan with East Asians generally, and Chinese in particular, did not take long to manifest itself as multiple accounts of discrimination emerged. In Western countries this played on traditional racial tropes such as sordid animal markets and uncleanliness. Reflecting an entirely different experience, namely apprehension over Chinese influence, regional reaction was also alarmist. Both say as much about perceptions of mainland China as of the disease itself.
There is no shortage of recent examples that demonstrate medical scapegoating around a novel or poorly understood disease. In 2010, the lynching of voodoo priests in Haiti originated with rumours of pout kolera (magic cholera powder) deliberately poisoning the water supply. The choice of target was partially reflected in the complex history of voodoo practitioners and the Haitian State. At times associated with resistance to foreign occupation, at others integrated into the personality cults of Haiti’s twentieth century dictatorships, notably that of ‘Papa Doc’ Duvalier. Confusion over the origins of the cholera epidemic ‘fed on feelings of insecurity and fear’, in turn fuelling stigmatization and violence.[vi] More sustained anger eventually shifted towards the unwitting culprits, negligent United Nations peacekeepers that had contaminated the Artibonite river with cholera-infected faeces.
Vodou ceremony, Jacmel, Haiti, 2002. Image: ‘Doron’.
A corollary of medical scapegoating is fear and misinformation. Fundamental weaknesses in the Pakistani health sector, combined with accusations of a fake Hepatitis B campaign orchestrated to locate and kill Osama Bin Laden, has reinforced suspicions of polio vaccinations. With rumours of polio vaccines being either harmful or simply a front for intelligence gathering, health workers have since borne the brunt of attacks by armed groups.[vii] Misunderstandings and distortions around Ebola, both in West Africa in 2014 and more recently in the Democratic Republic of Congo have led directly to the deaths of medical staff. In the latter case, mistrust over the response is rampant, provoked in part by ‘community resentment’ over the focus on Ebola while ignoring underlying problems in the country.[viii]
The targeting of health workers as somehow responsible for bringing illness into a community, and thus the cause or at least the visible manifestation of a terrifying epidemic, is an extreme example of the need to apportion blame. But if sickness has historically been portrayed as a punishment for sin, socially excluded groups and minorities have proven most vulnerable. Whether linked to mortality or fear of the unknown, context is key to understanding the long history of how those on the margins of society have been scapegoated. Much as nineteenth century descriptions of Chinese immigrants as ‘walking time bombs of infection’ cannot be separated from pervasive Sinophobia, the frequent panic associated with novel or misunderstood illness has tended to reinforce pre-existing stereotypes.[ix]
From Tragedy to Farce
The fate of Chick Gin aside, apportioning individual responsibility for epidemics is unusual in that it is difficult to prove. ‘Typhoid Mary’ is likely the most infamous example as she came to be seen as ‘synonymous with the health menace posed by the foreign-born.’[x] An Irish immigrant cook, Mary Mallon was a so-called healthy carrier of typhoid bacteria, unintentionally instigating outbreaks amongst her wealthy employers in New York until she was eventually tracked down in 1906. Vilified in the papers as a ‘walking typhoid fever factory’ or a ‘human culture tube’,[xi] Mallon would end her days in forced isolation.
‘Typhoid’ Mary Mallon in hospital.
On a more grandiose scale, Canadian air steward Gaëtan Dugas was posthumously declared ‘Patient Zero’, accused of intentionally infecting his partners with HIV and provoking the spread of AIDS in North America.[xii] Although later disproved, the fear and exclusion of the five ‘H’s – homosexuals, heroin addicts, haemophiliacs, hookers and Haitians – remained commonplace in the 1980s.
Much like the five ‘H’s, easier to trace is the scapegoating of entire groups, the archetypal example almost certainly being the pogroms and massacres inflicted on European Jews during the Black Death. Rumours of an ‘anti-Christian international conspiracy’ fit snugly with long-standing antisemitism, particularly when mortality rates among Jews were seen as inexplicably low (the fact that sensible hygiene laws laid out in the book of Leviticus had been employed was entirely ignored). Initially directed at medieval lepers and vagrants, Jews came to be accused of poisoning wells, eventually resulting in the extermination of entire communities.[xiii] Six hundred years later hygiene control of typhus, a lice-borne pathogen, became an element of Nazi propaganda intended to justify the mass murder of human carriers during the Holocaust.[xiv]
Representation of a massacre of the Jews in 1349 Antiquitates Flandriae (Royal Library of Belgium).
The transatlantic journey of yellow fever holds particular irony in the history of racial stereotyping over disease. The mosquito-borne virus’s first documented appearance in the New World was in 1647 Barbados. Even if thoroughly misunderstood at the time, much like malaria there was an assumption that black Africans were immune to the disease, all the more so as white Europeans were so highly susceptible (in reality this was largely due to early exposure during childhood). This immunity in turn became one of the justifications on which the Atlantic slave system was built. Brutal conditions on the sugar plantations and corresponding high mortality rates ensured continued new arrivals, often with the same immunity, all the while reinforcing the original racial stereotype. It was only as slavery was gradually abolished in the nineteenth century, a period coinciding with multiple outbreaks of yellow fever in the American South, that former slaves were themselves accused of spreading the disease.[xv]
Skibbereen, west Cork, in 1847 by James Mahony.
Cholera likewise has a special place in the history of medical scapegoating and became highly politicized. Despite having long circulated locally on the Indian subcontinent, it only emerged on the global stage in the early nineteenth century, an appearance closely intertwined with colonial trade policies. As the bacteria must be ingested through contaminated water or food, the poorest and most deprived urban areas proved most vulnerable. And given the profile of its victims, the spread of cholera inevitably took on class connotations that shifted smoothly towards immigrants, even as disease transmission came to be better understood. The Irish migratory experience was strongly marked by outbreaks of cholera, with higher mortality rates used as ‘corroboration that they were carriers of the disease’ rather than a reflection of widespread discrimination and impoverishment.[xvi]
The link between poverty and disease was particularly apparent with venereal disease, more specifically syphilis (and gonorrhoea with which it was often confused). Referred to at times as the ‘secret plague’ given the strong underreporting, symptoms had been recognizable since the late fifteenth century. And while there had long been a feminized connotation as per responsibility, hence the expression ‘one night with Venus and a lifetime with Mercury’, apportioning syphilitic blame took on far more sinister connotations through the later association with underprivileged women. Various incarnations of the Contagious Diseases Act in 1860s Britain essentially allowed the arrest and forced treatment of prostitutes in an attempt to limit venereal disease in the military, and subsequently the broader population.[xvii]
The emergence of syphilis also provoked an unusual example of xenophobic scapegoating, essentially a bizarre etymological battle that took on global proportions. As the disease spread throughout Europe and beyond, rivals were duly named responsible. For the French it was the Neapolitan disease, the Italians vice versa; the Russians blamed the Poles; the Dutch turned towards the Spanish; in Japan it emerged as the ‘Chinese ulcer’; while the Turks were less discerning, simply referring to the Christian disease.[xviii] The 1918 influenza pandemic likewise went through multiple national incarnations before settling on the familiar Spanish flu, a reference to the neutral country that first reported the disease. Both examples border on the farcical and if there are lessons to be learned, at least as far as 1918 is concerned, it is rather the impact of censorship and misinformation in controlling a pandemic.[xix]
Lessons Unlearned
Being reminded of past madness has a purpose, especially as we have a nasty habit of repeating our errors. Our understandable fear of disease sadly has often revealed our basest instincts, further stigmatizing the most vulnerable and endangering the health of all. Barbaric reflexes are never far from the surface. The emergence of a new pandemic has provoked ugly reactions very much reminiscent of the past, and counterproductive to controlling both the disease and the corresponding panic. While there are no rules to the patterns of hate linked to epidemics, just as increased social cohesiveness is also a potential consequence, the choice of scapegoating targets is not random. Facile demonization of the ‘foreign’ remains a perpetual risk, and disease a convenient pretext.
As for Chick Gin, he was merely the first of many plague fatalities in 1900 San Francisco. Over the next eight years at least one-hundred-and-seventy-two others would perish, both Chinese and non-Chinese.
[ix] Quote taken from testimony to Congress in 1876 over the state of Chinese immigration, Mary Roberts Coolidge, Chinese Immigration, Arno Press: New York, 1969 (original 1909), p. 106.
[xi] ‘Woman ‘Typhoid Factory’ Held a Prisoner’, The Evening World, New York, 1 April 1907.
[xii] Charlie Campbell, Scapegoat: A History of Blaming Other People, Duckworth Overlook: London, 2011, p. 161.
[xiii] John Kelly, The Great Mortality: An intimate History of the Black Death, Harper: London, 2006, pp. 232, 248.
[xiv] Samuel K. Cohn, Pandemics: Waves of Disease, Waves of Hate from the Plague of Athens to A.I.D.S., Historical journal (Cambridge, England), 2012 November 1; 85(230): 535-555.
[xv] Sheldon Watts, Epidemics and History: Disease, Power and Imperialism, Yale University Press: London, 1999, pp. 245-246.
[xvi] Philip Alcabes, Dread: How Fear and Fantasy have Fueled Epidemics from the Black Death to Avian Flu, Public Affairs: New York, 2009, pp. 74-75, 77.
Having grown up around favelas in the East Side of São Paulo I was expecting a similar scene of poverty mixed with a strong sense of community. Instead Moria has a post-war feeling, as it is for many people living there, who showed me evidence on their phones of the destruction they were escaping. It’s a tough and unfriendly place, until you meet the families.
The first smell that hits you is the smoke from wood, plastic and anything else that burns, as they cook on open fires. A blind person would think the whole place was on fire. The second smell is a strong male odour. It’s there because there are hardly any facilities for people to wash.
It’s completely dirty everywhere. The bathrooms are covered in shit. It’s even on the ground where people do business and cook food.
But life goes on. There are market stalls selling soft drinks, fruit and vegetables and clothing. I met two barbers working within their communities.
“The first smell that hits you first is the smoke from wood, plastic and anything else that burns, as they cook on open fires.” Moria Camp, Lesbos, December 2019. Fellipe Lopes.
The air pollution and dreadful hygiene cause a lot of sickness. The men also smoke a lot. Everyone is coughing all the time. I developed a chest infection myself afterwards. The Irish doctor said it came from bacteria prevalent in camps such as this.
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) do have a medical facility, but the clinic is overwhelmed. They can’t accommodate everybody. Whether you get medical attention also depends on which camp you live in. If you are lucky you might get to attend a hospital in Mytilene, the capital and main town of the island of Lesbos.
At one point a lady from Syria showed me a document indicating she suffers from cancer, but she wasn’t receiving the medication she requires.
Many of the kids have skin problems. But the worst part is the mental torture of living in the camp that brings out the worst human characteristics.
At one point a guy passed five metres away from me with a machete, a massive knife, and I heard the noise of stabbing. As a photo-journalist my instinct was to go and take a shot, but as soon as I moved a friend, Mohammed, held me back, saying what must have been “don’t go” in Arabic. I understood from the strength he exerted that I shouldn’t move.
An African man had been killed. The perpetrator disappeared. This sort of thing happens every single day in a camp built for a maximum of 4,000 people, now housing more than 20,000 and growing. A friend said that over the last two weeks another two hundred tents had been erected. I looked down and saw a wave of them across the hillside.
Yet I didn’t feel unsafe. As the days went by I became more confident. I knew the friends I had been introduced to would protect me. That’s how it works in Moria.
Moria Camp, Lesbos, December 2019. Fellipe Lopes
When you enter the camp you notice the separation between nationalities. In one part there are Africans, mainly from Somalia, Sudan, Ethiopia and Congo, in another you find the dominant Afghan groups, with black and white scarfs speaking different languages. There is a small part of the camp where the Syrians live.
I grew close to the Syrian community, speaking a mixture of broken Arabic and broken English, and also using phones to translate. Most of them say the system is not working for them; that if you are a Syrian in Moria you have no chance of being relocated elsewhere in the European Union. You will be denied documents.
Many Syrians believe they are stuck there forever. I met members of one family who have been waiting for a year-and-a-half now.
In general, cases are not being resolved. There are people waiting for official refugee status, or waiting other documentation. Each case is different. But some people are being scheduled for appointments in 2021, just to start the process. Until then they are not permitted to leave the island. They have to sit and wait in the apocalypse that is Moria.
The Prison’
There are three areas in the camp. First there is the so-called ‘Friendly Campus’ run by Movement on the Ground, which has most of the better accommodation, which is not saying a lot. Throughout the camp you find structures built from any wood and plastic they find, and tents of different sizes; some are big enough to sleep twenty people, others are the kind of two-man tents you would expect to see at a music festival.
Then there is ‘the Prison’, which is the original camp. There you find the so-called ‘boxes’, which are temporary structures, some of which even have AC devices that take the chill off the freezing January temperatures. Journalists are not allowed to enter this part. A bus sits at the entrance with eight policemen bearing big guns. But where there is a will there is a way.
The Prison, Moria camp, Lesbos. Fellipe Lopes
I entered with a small camera inside my jacket pocket. People were helping me to get in and out. They knew when and where there would be no cops around and I could walk in and out.
Another part is called ‘the Jungle’, which is really a forest where people are living. I met one guy who had carved a hole in a tree and now sleeps inside the bark with a plastic sheet for shelter. A man forced to live inside a tree in the European Union in 2020.
“I met one guy who had carved a hole in a tree and now sleeps inside the bark with a plastic sheet for shelter.” Moria camp, Lesbos, December 2019. Fellipe Lopes
There is a part of the camp that has electricity, and where people can charge their phones. Most parts, however, have no access whatsoever.
They cook for themselves, improvising with things like old paint tins over open fires. The camp is next to an olive grove so there is some wood available and they burn whatever else they can find.
There are two options for food. The first is to take it directly from the camp dispensary. There you queue and receive a free meal. On Sundays you get chicken and rice; for the rest of the week it’s beans and vegetables.
But the food is awful. I couldn’t imagine eating it. So what most families do is recook it, using containers to carry it to their fires, mixing it with the spices they carry. It seems to become a bit more digestible.
Another option is available to families who receive allowances of approximately €90 per month. They can catch a bus, or take a one-hour-and-a-half journey by foot, to the island’s capital Mytilene and purchase the cheapest food they find in the supermarket, usually rice, beans or noodles.
How much any family receives seems to be a lottery. There is no apparent formula. Some families get nothing. The lucky ones are given a UNHCR MasterCard with credit on it rather than hard cash.
For water there are taps to refill plastic bottles. I drank it a few times and thankfully it didn’t make me ill. Locals don’t seem to drink the tap water.
Moria camp, Lesbos, December 2019. Fellipe Lopes
The frequency of rape
Until I came to Moria, I had never been to a place where there was no sense of hope. In the favelas people have a seriously tough life, but most of them believe that things will get better. In Moria, however, ninety percent of people I spoke to believe they will be staying there forever. They don’t see a future, believing either they will be killed, or live out their days there. Just a few families I spoke to saw a light at the end of the tunnel.
One thing I heard that made me feel really emotional was that I was bringing hope: “you are a guy from Brazil living in another country. You are an immigrant too who came here to tell our stories”.
In the camps there are loads of suicides, including kids under the age of ten.
One thing I should say is that rape is getting more frequent inside the camp. Women are of course victims, but I have heard that a number of young boys between the ages of seven and twelve have been targeted too.
One man came to me and told me his heart was breaking. He took my phone, translating from Arabic into English that his young son had been raped in the bathrooms. He said he was afraid to inform the authorities because he feared retaliation. As a result he, and others, keep their kids inside the tents.
Some of the families do manage to send their kids to school. But I didn’t hear of any teenagers attending high school. They go to cultural centres, the Hope Project and One Happy Family, where they spend an hour painting or playing football, and can take English lessons. But there is no regular schooling for that age group.
Empowerment and Love
European NGO workers say they want to empower people living in the camp. But how do you empower someone living in these conditions? The NGOS are doing what they can, but people are unfamiliar with the European concept of empowerment.
Yet around the rest of the island life goes on as normal. You would hardly even know Moria existed, with farmers working the fields, on an island that is a place of great natural beauty, and still popular with tourists.
There is some local sympathy for the refugees, but it has to be said most people are inclined to ignore them. Taxi drivers were asking why I was going there, or warned me against visiting.
On one occasion I was in a supermarket where a cashier refused to serve a Congolese man. She just told him to get out. She said he couldn’t make his purchase. She wouldn’t accept his card, so I intervened to pay for his drink and snack.
Another time a Syrian family came along with us to a restaurant. The waiter would not direct a word at them, and looked for the permission of myself and my colleague Caoimhe Butterly for what they could order.
I was lucky enough to be staying in guesthouse accommodation in Mytilene. Every night when I called a taxi to get away from the foul-smelling camp I felt a wave of guilt. Knowing how those people were living made me uncomfortable in my clean bed.
On New Year’s Eve we hung out with friends from Syria, Ghana and Ethiopia in the town. We went to a bar, where people were drinking and taking drugs.
Towards the end of the evening Haya from Syria began crying. She said: “I wished so much to be outside the camp, and now I see those people having fun and I just miss my family. I just want to be in the box. Because that is all I have left in my life. I don’t have money, I don’t have a job, I don’t have expectations. The only thing I have left is my family, and I’m here.”
That broke my heart, as I had a similar feeling after a phone call with my mother in Brazil. At the end of the day you have your family.
What holds those people together? It is love. There is no social programme. There is nothing from the U.N. and there is nothing much from the NGOs either. If you get close to them, to the families, what you find is loads of love between them, and kindness to strangers. That generosity of spirit holds us together.
