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Fifty pages of dossier. One more raw than the other. It is the reconstruction of the deficiencies, the errors, the chaotic information in this damned pandemic. coronavirus. He did it Robert Lingard, founder of a public relations agency in London, relative of one of the Bergamo victims and member of the “Noi Denunceremo” Committee. Many questions. Did Italy have a risk communication plan? Did you handle the news better to feed the media and citizens? And, above all, has the government been transparent as prescribed by the WHO manuals or has it kept irrationally hidden data and “secret plans” of various kinds?
Let’s start here: according to the WHO, a national plan against a pandemic must also include a Communication plan. The reason is easy to understand: the correct information plays a “fundamental mitigating role by allowing the population to adopt the preventive behaviors necessary to safeguard their health, but also the social and economic consequences that may arise from a pandemic that is not properly contained” . Back in 2005, Jong-wook Lee, ex General Manager of the WHO, said that “communication is as fundamental for the containment of a fire as are laboratory or epidemiological analyzes.” Good. But if a communication plan is so important for the WHO, Lingard wonders what it is like. Is it possible that in Italy “at the end of February many institutional authorities and almost the entire Italian population continued to think that the coronavirus was a trivial flu?” And why did the prime minister and his ministers sing the praises of a country “very willing” to handle the emergency, when it was not?
According to Lingard, in January Italy did not have “a risk communication plan”, just as it lacked – it is now known – a pandemic plan updated. To prove it, Lingard compares the Swiss communication strategy with ours. While Italy’s “Pandemic Plan” dedicates only half a page to risk communication, in the Swiss there are eight juicy and well-detailed pages. The indications range from the creation of a Select Committee that manages information to communication strategies based on the pandemic phase, obviously going through the fight against disinformation and the development of alternative channels to traditional media, such as social networks. You will say: logical and rational. Why then did Italy not have it so detailed? And why did the government commission press conferences? Today in Borrelli, tomorrow in the ISS, the day after tomorrow in Arcuri? And can Prime Minister Conte’s live broadcasts late at night, with hours of announcement delay, be configured as suitable communication options?
And to think that the WHO had also done some on the subject guidelines. All this long before the arrival of Sars-CoV-2. “As early as 2005 – writes Lingard – the WHO publishes a real manual entitled Effective communication with the media during public health emergencies, and focused on the management of communication by the media in health emergency situations. “A detailed document, where among other things” even the 77 most frequently asked questions by journalists during an emergency are listed. “In 2017, however , WHO updated the guidelines to include social media in the models. Did Italy do it? “Again, the answer is no,” Lingard writes. And in fact it took months before the government decided to involve the various Ferragnez.
But it’s mostly the chapter “transparency“. What the experts say Cts, who have repeatedly requested confidentiality about the “secret plan” carried out within the Committee, the WHO guidelines prescribe maximum clarity. Of course, exceptions are allowed, but only in the event that the dissemination of information during an epidemic could “compromise national security”, violate privacy, or could lead to the stigmatization of “specific ethnic groups or geographic regions.” Don’t post the anti “secret plan” COVID-19, where thousands of infections and deaths were expected, does it fall in these cases? Not according to Lingard, who adds: “If the scenarios had such catastrophic potential, they were already available on January 20 and it was good to work to contain the contagion. Why then is the first preventative guide published in four videos on the website of Ministry of Health For the first time only on February 20? “.
It is no coincidence, therefore, that the Global Health Safety Index, which assesses the health security and response capacities of 195 countries, places Italy at the bottom of the risk communication ranking. With a score of 25/100, Belpaese is 76th. “The available evidence – writes the GHS Index – does not indicate that Italy has a national response plan for autonomous health emergencies, incorporated in a single planning document. The Italian civil protection system has a policy of risk communication well developed, but focused on natural disasters ”. According to Lingard, the lack of transparency is the basis of the different appetizers of Zingaretti, the dinners of Gori, the statements of Salvini and the videos #Milanononsiferma or #Bergamoisrunning. If he “secret plan“If it had been made known or shared at least with the Regions, perhaps the country would have gotten rid of those (dangerous) ballets.” “Were opposition leaders aware of the CTS rush to build an operational plan to counter the epidemic? – asks Lingard – And the mayors? ”. Obviously not, otherwise they would have spoken in unison. “If they haven’t been informed, why haven’t they been informed of the seriousness of the situation? Why was the attempt to involve representatives from the entire institutional world with total transparency omitted to get the population to adopt preventive behaviors? ”.
The many questions for now are missing answers. As there are many doubts about that month between the end of January and the case of Codogno. On January 30, in fact, Speranza goes to the Chamber to obtain information on the “Chinese” virus and is aware of the risks, to ensure that SARS-CoV-2, “Despite being classified as type B in terms of dangerousness”, it will be treated as if it were the plague. So why do we crash to the ground? For Lingard it is the fault of the “month of delay in the activation of the entire organizational machine”. “Those who have chosen not to communicate the seriousness of the situation clearly and transparently, certainly cannot say that they do not know. Therefore, it was probably motivated by very different intentions. What could these intentions have been? Not ignoring the pressures coming from a part of the productive world? Not highlighting the inadequacy of Italian planning for a pandemic? “. All the questions that make Lingard say, aware of the harshness of what he claims, that Bergamo and Brescia during the first wave” were sent to dieAnd that perhaps something more can be done to save dozens of lives.
