{"id":15491,"date":"2021-12-22T15:09:49","date_gmt":"2021-12-22T21:09:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev-journalismcourses.pantheonsite.io\/?p=15491"},"modified":"2022-05-23T15:10:25","modified_gmt":"2022-05-23T20:10:25","slug":"need-and-greed-reporting-on-covid-19-in-southern-africa-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journalismcourses.org\/es\/need-and-greed-reporting-on-covid-19-in-southern-africa-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Need and greed: Reporting on COVID-19 in Southern Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Mandi
Mandi Smallhorne is a freelance science journalist in Johannesburg, South Africa. She is President of the South African Science Journalists Association.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This special briefing is also available in French,<\/a>\u00a0Portuguese<\/a> and Spanish<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa \u2014\u00a0Mia Malan, executive director and editor-in-chief at the Bhekisisa Centre for Health Journalism in Johannesburg, South Africa, says: \u201cIf you want to report on COVID-19 in a meaningful way, it\u2019s not good enough to just understand the science.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a country where the vast majority of people are poor and disadvantaged, you need \u201can ability to combine science with policy and an understanding of social injustice,\u201d she adds. As an independent, donor-funded media organisation focused on health and social justice issues across Africa, Bhekisisa has played a critical role in reporting on the pandemic from the outset.<\/p>\n

\"CoveringCOVID-19 arrived in southern Africa in early March 2020, yet another pandemic following on the heels of tuberculosis and the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the epidemic on which health journalists like Malan, living in HIV\u2019s epicentre, had cut their teeth in the late 90s and early 2000s.<\/p>\n

HIV taught us the importance of providing the socioeconomic and political context in which a disease happens. It is not just about reporting the research or understanding the drugs, as Malan says; it\u2019s about understanding who you are reporting to, how they live, and under what constraints. Do they have access to or money for medical care, for treatment, for nutrition to support treatment? Do they understand the terminology you use? Science journalist Sibusiso Biyela says, when reporting news for people whose home language does not include words or concepts vital to conveying the science or clinical course of a disease, reporters have to \u201cfigure it out on the fly,\u201d to find ways of expressing the inexpressible.<\/p>\n

Understanding the context<\/strong><\/p>\n

To report effectively on COVID-19 in southern Africa, it\u2019s important to understand how the pandemic has affected the region. A scan of the latest figures in a stats source like\u00a0Worldometer<\/a> gives the impression that African countries have not really suffered as Europe and the USA have. In part, that may be due to the massive \u201cyouth bulge\u201d in our demographics: in Zambia, for example, over two thirds of the population are 24 or younger, while just over 5 percent are over 55; in Zimbabwe, the median age is just over 20; in Mozambique it\u2019s 17.3.<\/p>\n

But gaps in data may obscure some of the direct toll; and the indirect toll is revealed by\u00a0excess death rates<\/a>. Informed by past experience with Ebola and other epidemics, African governments reacted quickly to the advent of COVID-19 with\u00a0international travel bans<\/a> and internal restrictions, which had dire economic fallout: \u201cIn 2020, Sub-Saharan Africa experienced the worst underperformance ever recorded, with a growth rate of -1.9%, coupled with an\u00a0increase of 32 million<\/a> people living in extreme poverty. Healthcare systems, education and other essential services were massively disrupted. Moreover, developed countries\u2019 rush to secure supplies of medical equipment and vaccines caused serious shortages in low- and middle-income countries, leading to much worse health outcomes and widening inequality,\u201d as C\u00f4te d\u2019Ivoire\u2019s President,\u00a0Alassane Ouattara, wrote in September 2020.<\/p>\n

Southern Africa was in poor shape to face this emergency. A climate crisis hotspot, it had been hammered by two droughts in rapid succession; many millions of people in countries like Zambia<\/a> and\u00a0Zimbabwe<\/a> faced hunger by the beginning of 2020, and fully a\u00a0third of Namibia\u2019s<\/a> people were affected by its worst drought in 90 years.<\/p>\n

2020\/2021 harvests were remarkably good in South Africa, the country hardest hit by COVID-19 itself. But it is struggling to recover from \u201can accelerating downward spiral of decline,\u201d<\/a> which gathered speed during the presidency of Jacob Zuma, resulting in institutional degeneration, widespread accusations of corruption, and economic growth figures way below what was needed to tackle the growing problems of massive unemployment and deepening inequity: less than a quarter of the population enjoys a middle-class or better lifestyle; the vast remainder are stuck in grinding poverty.<\/p>\n

\"South
A typical informal settlement in South Africa\u2019s North West Province. (Mandi Smallhorne)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In the news<\/strong><\/p>\n

Newsrooms here, which had been absorbed by the demanding politics of the country (and which had, over the years, shed science and health desks) now had to suddenly wrap their heads around a 24\/7 story that required an ability to find and interrogate science and scientists, follow and interpret statistics \u2013 and see all of this information through the lens of the socioeconomic realities. Even independent journalism organizations dedicated to health reporting, such as Bhekisisa and Health-e News, had their work cut out trying to hold a 360-degree view of the virus, the clinical course of the disease, the treatment, and the socioeconomic context.<\/p>\n

That context promptly worsened.\u00a0From March 27, 2020 onward, South Africa saw the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs due to a hard lockdown in the big regional economy, which exerts a magnetic pull on neighboring economies.\u00a0The ripple effects were rapidly apparent. \u201cHunger and food insecurity \u2013 the disruption of food intake or eating patterns because of lack of money and other resources \u2013 have\u00a0increased in South Africa<\/a> due to the pandemic\u2026\u201d, according to Professors Servaas van der Berg and Leila Patel, writing in The Conversation in July 2021.<\/p>\n

The differences between the pandemic experience in the relatively wealthy Global North and our experiences in South and southern Africa were plain long before vaccine inequity reared its head: with a pared-down fiscus, a South African government which had lost an estimated\u00a0R1.5 trillion due to corruption<\/a> alone from 2014-2019 could only offer R350 a month (about $22, not even close to the much disputed $1.90 dollar-a-day level of poverty) through a Social Relief of Distress grant, as well as some support for employers (the Temporary Employer-Employee Relief Scheme). In\u00a0neighbouring countries like Zimbabwe,<\/a> job losses, inflationary shocks to food prices, and inadequate social support caused severe distress.<\/p>\n

Small as South Africa\u2019s grants were, they made a huge difference; unfortunately, they also drew the attention of the ever-circling vultures keen to enrich themselves from the pot intended to help the very poor. By September 2020, NGO Corruption Watch was claiming that \u201cless than half of those eligible<\/a> [for the social grants] have received them, while others have fraudulently tried to claim.\u201d News of corruption just kept coming: corruption around personal protective equipment (PPE) tenders<\/a>, fogging of schools, and even, in a scandal that resulted in a change of Minister of Health, involving a tender to do\u00a0communications<\/a> around COVID-19.<\/p>\n

\"South
A typical informal settlement in South Africa\u2019s North West Province. (Mandi Smallhorne)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Lessons for media<\/strong><\/p>\n

Stories about corruption and failures of government are meat and drink to journalists who have worked in this region in recent decades. But, stories about science, not so much.<\/p>\n

The lack of familiarity with the sciences and research can lead, as Biyela points out, to reporting with potentially unfortunate consequences. If you don\u2019t fully grasp the uncertainties of evolving science, it is all too easy to write a story that is too sure, too unqualified (\u201cOmicron results in mild disease,\u201d for example). Informing the media-consuming public about the process of science is vital, he says; if the reader does not understand how science unfolds and progresses, definitive statements in reporting may make them feel they\u2019re being lied to or fooled \u2013 which makes them more vulnerable to disinformation.<\/p>\n

Some basic principles of journalism should be followed in science or health stories, as in others, Biyela says:<\/p>\n