Item
Christopher Combs, Garima Sehgal, Ore Benson Oral History, 2021/12/08
Media
Title (Dublin Core)
Christopher Combs, Garima Sehgal, Ore Benson Oral History, 2021/12/08
Description (Dublin Core)
This podcast covers the ways that learning about past pandemics has affected our attitude toward, or perception of, the current pandemic.
Recording Date (Dublin Core)
Creator (Dublin Core)
Type (Dublin Core)
audio
Controlled Vocabulary (Dublin Core)
English
Government Federal
English
Health & Wellness
Curator's Tags (Omeka Classic)
Contributor's Tags (a true folksonomy) (Friend of a Friend)
Date Submitted (Dublin Core)
12/08/2021
Date Modified (Dublin Core)
04/26/2022
05/04/2022
05/25/2022
Date Created (Dublin Core)
12/08/2021
Interviewer (Bibliographic Ontology)
Christopher Combs
Garima Sehgal
Ore Benson
Interviewee (Bibliographic Ontology)
Christopher Combs
Garima Sehgal
Ore Benson
Format (Dublin Core)
audio
Language (Dublin Core)
English
Duration (Omeka Classic)
00:07:04
abstract (Bibliographic Ontology)
Three College students, Christopher Combs, Garima Sehgal and Ore Brenson, interview each other for this school assignment. In this interview they discuss past pandemics and compare it to COVID 19. They also discuss social response to past pandemics and how those responses compare today. These students also highlight some differences between the two and note some key aspects that show lack of progression in society as far as response to disease.
Transcription (Omeka Classic)
Ore Benson 00:01
Hello, my name is Ore Benson. And right as begin asking the following questions Do I have your consent to be interviewed for the COVID-19 archive project? Interviewee please state your name, the date and time.
Garima Sehgal 00:17
Hello, my name is Garima Sehgal. It is currently December 8 to 2021 10am. Yes, you have my consent to ask these questions.
Ore Benson 00:25
Have the past pandemics like Ebola or the black dead change your view on COVID-19 today?
Garima Sehgal 00:32
As a result of studying the long history of pandemics I understand why it is so difficult to exterminate pandemic pandemics altogether. Learn the history of pandemics is highly crucial to avoid mistakes made in the past and to improve for the future. pandemics are linked to the political, social and economic status of a country, as each has a very important part in the survival of the pandemic within a country. COVID-19 is immune mutant of past pandemics that can certainly be traced back to decades. For example, officials in Africa believed Ebola would just burn out on its own, but instead, it took the lives of many innocent people due to poor precautionary measures taken by leaders. Therefore, learning the history of pandemics is highly crucial to avoid these mistakes.
Ore Benson 01:15
What steps need to be taken to avoid such hearts situations in the future?
Garima Sehgal 01:21
Pandemics will definitely occur in the future due to the common frequency of mutations and unsanitary conditions that exist and will continue to exist in our world today. From the knowledge and experiences we have collected as a human race, it is important to understand how to prevent a pandemic from growing until it's completely out of control. The first is an establishment of functioning healthcare system everywhere. Second, it's essential to ensure direction and coordination from an internationalist perspective through a well funded, complete, competently staffed and vigilant World Health Organization. Lastly, the relationship between the global international system and public health cannot be ignored. An economic system that neglects what economics called negative externalities will mean a heavy cost in terms of public health. I agree with Snowdens recommendations. Because the West African epidemic reveal that in the absence of four measures of proper measure, excuse me, the world runs a severe risk of tragic and unavoidable suffering.
Garima Sehgal 02:25
Now I will ask Hello, my name is Garima Sehgal. Before I begin asking the following questions, do I have your consent to be interviewed for the COVID-19 project? Interview? Please state your name, date and time.
Christopher Combs 02:37
Hello, my name is Christopher Combs. It's currently December 8 2021. And the current time is 10am. And yes, you do have my consent to ask these questions.
Garima Sehgal 02:45
Did learning about past pandemics helped put this current pandemic into context in terms of our societal responses to COVID-19?
Christopher Combs 02:52
Yes, learning about past pandemics really helped frame our society's response to COVID-19. For me, in fact, I'm actually very shocked at how similar our collective reactions were when compared to pandemics that took place far in the past. For example, in Bokashi, his description of the public response to the Buubonic plague, he describes how the public split into three camps consisting of isolation, denial and moderation. To me, these three categories fit perfectly with how people responded to COVID-19. As we saw many people either self isolate during the initial quarantine, ignore guidelines and party or take a more rational approach to the pandemic and follow more moderate guidelines. For me personally, seeing the similarities between the past and present responses was somewhat disheartening, as it proved that socially our society has not made many advancements when it comes to disease response. That said, I think that COVID-19 has been a huge learning experience for everyone, and that when faced with future pandemics, we will respond in a more rational and thoughtful manner.
Garima Sehgal 03:51
Thank you. How does the current COVID 19 pandemic compared to past pandemics, namely the 1918 influenza?
Christopher Combs 03:58
There are many parallels between the current COVID 19 pandemic and the 1918 influenza. Firstly, both pandemic sparked a large amount of controversy over the enforcement of wearing masks in public areas. In fact, during the 1918 influenza pandemic, people were actually arrested and fined for not wearing masks, punishments that are far more severe than those in place currently. Another major similarity between these two pandemics was the fact that school closures occurred in both instances as a result of the disease. However, the school closures that resulted from COVID-19 lasted much longer than the actions taken in 1918, and were far more widespread. While there are many aspects of these two diseases that are similar, one of the major differences between them is the medical response in terms of vaccine development. Given that flu vaccines are difficult to effectively develop and oftentimes don't effectively prevent the disease. The vaccine efforts during the 19 influenza pandemic were far less widespread than those resulting from COVID-19 which can be demonstrated to the fact that we currently have multiple COVID-19 tene vaccines only a year and a half after the diseases first became apparent. All right. So my name is Chris Combs. And before I begin asking the following questions, do I have your consent to be interviewed for the COVID-19 archive project? Interviewee, please state, your name, the date and time.
Ore Benson 05:19
Hello, my name is Ore Benson. It is December 8 2021. And 10am. Yes, you have my consent to ask these questions.
Christopher Combs 05:27
Awesome. Do you think that we have improved public health response when compared to past pandemics? If so, what types of measures have we implemented?
Ore Benson 05:35
Yes, I believe that learning about price pandemics has actually helped us in the past, because we can see the main protocols with what worked and what didn't. The government has a general idea to start from, with the way that we could start. They have intervals that they saw worked in the past and saw the similarities in the pandemics like the flu and the Black Death I follow the rules and regulations. It is crucial to understand the history of pandemics in order to prevent past, prevent mistakes, committed and past into better for the future. And think about how people responded to smallpox or were scared it made us scared we were able to know what happened in the past and how to change that. For example, mask became a role.
Christopher Combs 06:17
I think that's really great that you touched on looking at past pandemics and kind of learning from past responses to see what works and what doesn't moving into the future. Moving on, in what ways have your views on the current pandemic stay the same or change throughout learning about the history of global pandemics?
Ore Benson 06:32
I believe my views have stayed pretty consistent throughout this pandemic has made people react the same way as people in the past, pandemics have reacted. I believe masks do help us in the in this time where we can easily contract COVID. And seeing that masks were being worn at a time of influenza it shows us that we could do the same and still generally, generally be safe. Listening to the government keeps us top of things has made it easier than the past pandemics.
Christopher Combs 07:00
Thank you so much. And that concludes our interview.
Hello, my name is Ore Benson. And right as begin asking the following questions Do I have your consent to be interviewed for the COVID-19 archive project? Interviewee please state your name, the date and time.
Garima Sehgal 00:17
Hello, my name is Garima Sehgal. It is currently December 8 to 2021 10am. Yes, you have my consent to ask these questions.
Ore Benson 00:25
Have the past pandemics like Ebola or the black dead change your view on COVID-19 today?
Garima Sehgal 00:32
As a result of studying the long history of pandemics I understand why it is so difficult to exterminate pandemic pandemics altogether. Learn the history of pandemics is highly crucial to avoid mistakes made in the past and to improve for the future. pandemics are linked to the political, social and economic status of a country, as each has a very important part in the survival of the pandemic within a country. COVID-19 is immune mutant of past pandemics that can certainly be traced back to decades. For example, officials in Africa believed Ebola would just burn out on its own, but instead, it took the lives of many innocent people due to poor precautionary measures taken by leaders. Therefore, learning the history of pandemics is highly crucial to avoid these mistakes.
Ore Benson 01:15
What steps need to be taken to avoid such hearts situations in the future?
Garima Sehgal 01:21
Pandemics will definitely occur in the future due to the common frequency of mutations and unsanitary conditions that exist and will continue to exist in our world today. From the knowledge and experiences we have collected as a human race, it is important to understand how to prevent a pandemic from growing until it's completely out of control. The first is an establishment of functioning healthcare system everywhere. Second, it's essential to ensure direction and coordination from an internationalist perspective through a well funded, complete, competently staffed and vigilant World Health Organization. Lastly, the relationship between the global international system and public health cannot be ignored. An economic system that neglects what economics called negative externalities will mean a heavy cost in terms of public health. I agree with Snowdens recommendations. Because the West African epidemic reveal that in the absence of four measures of proper measure, excuse me, the world runs a severe risk of tragic and unavoidable suffering.
Garima Sehgal 02:25
Now I will ask Hello, my name is Garima Sehgal. Before I begin asking the following questions, do I have your consent to be interviewed for the COVID-19 project? Interview? Please state your name, date and time.
Christopher Combs 02:37
Hello, my name is Christopher Combs. It's currently December 8 2021. And the current time is 10am. And yes, you do have my consent to ask these questions.
Garima Sehgal 02:45
Did learning about past pandemics helped put this current pandemic into context in terms of our societal responses to COVID-19?
Christopher Combs 02:52
Yes, learning about past pandemics really helped frame our society's response to COVID-19. For me, in fact, I'm actually very shocked at how similar our collective reactions were when compared to pandemics that took place far in the past. For example, in Bokashi, his description of the public response to the Buubonic plague, he describes how the public split into three camps consisting of isolation, denial and moderation. To me, these three categories fit perfectly with how people responded to COVID-19. As we saw many people either self isolate during the initial quarantine, ignore guidelines and party or take a more rational approach to the pandemic and follow more moderate guidelines. For me personally, seeing the similarities between the past and present responses was somewhat disheartening, as it proved that socially our society has not made many advancements when it comes to disease response. That said, I think that COVID-19 has been a huge learning experience for everyone, and that when faced with future pandemics, we will respond in a more rational and thoughtful manner.
Garima Sehgal 03:51
Thank you. How does the current COVID 19 pandemic compared to past pandemics, namely the 1918 influenza?
Christopher Combs 03:58
There are many parallels between the current COVID 19 pandemic and the 1918 influenza. Firstly, both pandemic sparked a large amount of controversy over the enforcement of wearing masks in public areas. In fact, during the 1918 influenza pandemic, people were actually arrested and fined for not wearing masks, punishments that are far more severe than those in place currently. Another major similarity between these two pandemics was the fact that school closures occurred in both instances as a result of the disease. However, the school closures that resulted from COVID-19 lasted much longer than the actions taken in 1918, and were far more widespread. While there are many aspects of these two diseases that are similar, one of the major differences between them is the medical response in terms of vaccine development. Given that flu vaccines are difficult to effectively develop and oftentimes don't effectively prevent the disease. The vaccine efforts during the 19 influenza pandemic were far less widespread than those resulting from COVID-19 which can be demonstrated to the fact that we currently have multiple COVID-19 tene vaccines only a year and a half after the diseases first became apparent. All right. So my name is Chris Combs. And before I begin asking the following questions, do I have your consent to be interviewed for the COVID-19 archive project? Interviewee, please state, your name, the date and time.
Ore Benson 05:19
Hello, my name is Ore Benson. It is December 8 2021. And 10am. Yes, you have my consent to ask these questions.
Christopher Combs 05:27
Awesome. Do you think that we have improved public health response when compared to past pandemics? If so, what types of measures have we implemented?
Ore Benson 05:35
Yes, I believe that learning about price pandemics has actually helped us in the past, because we can see the main protocols with what worked and what didn't. The government has a general idea to start from, with the way that we could start. They have intervals that they saw worked in the past and saw the similarities in the pandemics like the flu and the Black Death I follow the rules and regulations. It is crucial to understand the history of pandemics in order to prevent past, prevent mistakes, committed and past into better for the future. And think about how people responded to smallpox or were scared it made us scared we were able to know what happened in the past and how to change that. For example, mask became a role.
Christopher Combs 06:17
I think that's really great that you touched on looking at past pandemics and kind of learning from past responses to see what works and what doesn't moving into the future. Moving on, in what ways have your views on the current pandemic stay the same or change throughout learning about the history of global pandemics?
Ore Benson 06:32
I believe my views have stayed pretty consistent throughout this pandemic has made people react the same way as people in the past, pandemics have reacted. I believe masks do help us in the in this time where we can easily contract COVID. And seeing that masks were being worn at a time of influenza it shows us that we could do the same and still generally, generally be safe. Listening to the government keeps us top of things has made it easier than the past pandemics.
Christopher Combs 07:00
Thank you so much. And that concludes our interview.
Item sets
This item was submitted on December 8, 2021 by [anonymous user] using the form “Share Your Story” on the site “A Journal of the Plague Year”: https://covid-19archive.org/s/archive
Click here to view the collected data.