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Attacks on Health Care Workers in Historical Pandemics and COVID-19

Previous pandemics have been (mis)used for (geo)political reasons, for terrorism purposes, and in times of conflict. Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has been no exception with populist politicians challenging the relations with China, calling it the “Chinese virus,” certain state actors setting up cy...

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Autores principales: van Stekelenburg, Brett C. A., De Cauwer, Harald, Barten, Dennis G., Mortelmans, Luc J.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Cambridge University Press 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9947042/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36474406
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/dmp.2022.275
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author van Stekelenburg, Brett C. A.
De Cauwer, Harald
Barten, Dennis G.
Mortelmans, Luc J.
author_facet van Stekelenburg, Brett C. A.
De Cauwer, Harald
Barten, Dennis G.
Mortelmans, Luc J.
author_sort van Stekelenburg, Brett C. A.
collection PubMed
description Previous pandemics have been (mis)used for (geo)political reasons, for terrorism purposes, and in times of conflict. Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has been no exception with populist politicians challenging the relations with China, calling it the “Chinese virus,” certain state actors setting up cyberterrorist actions against health care organizations in the United States and Europe, and a reported increase of violent acts against health care workers. Aside from state-driven factors, both left- and right-wing activists and anti-vaccination activists adhering to conspiracy theories are a threat for health care organizations. Furthermore, socioeconomic, religious, and cultural factors play a role in why health care is a possible target of violence. Fear of viral pathogens, fury about financial losses due to the pandemic and governmental measures such as lockdowns, anger because of mandatory quarantines, and the disruption of burial rituals are among the reasons for people to revolt against health care providers. Here, we provide a narrative review of the impact of violence against health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic and earlier pandemics, and suggest preventive strategies.
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spelling pubmed-99470422023-02-23 Attacks on Health Care Workers in Historical Pandemics and COVID-19 van Stekelenburg, Brett C. A. De Cauwer, Harald Barten, Dennis G. Mortelmans, Luc J. Disaster Med Public Health Prep Concepts in Disaster Medicine Previous pandemics have been (mis)used for (geo)political reasons, for terrorism purposes, and in times of conflict. Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has been no exception with populist politicians challenging the relations with China, calling it the “Chinese virus,” certain state actors setting up cyberterrorist actions against health care organizations in the United States and Europe, and a reported increase of violent acts against health care workers. Aside from state-driven factors, both left- and right-wing activists and anti-vaccination activists adhering to conspiracy theories are a threat for health care organizations. Furthermore, socioeconomic, religious, and cultural factors play a role in why health care is a possible target of violence. Fear of viral pathogens, fury about financial losses due to the pandemic and governmental measures such as lockdowns, anger because of mandatory quarantines, and the disruption of burial rituals are among the reasons for people to revolt against health care providers. Here, we provide a narrative review of the impact of violence against health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic and earlier pandemics, and suggest preventive strategies. Cambridge University Press 2022-12-07 /pmc/articles/PMC9947042/ /pubmed/36474406 http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/dmp.2022.275 Text en © The Author(s) 2022 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution and reproduction, provided the original article is properly cited.
spellingShingle Concepts in Disaster Medicine
van Stekelenburg, Brett C. A.
De Cauwer, Harald
Barten, Dennis G.
Mortelmans, Luc J.
Attacks on Health Care Workers in Historical Pandemics and COVID-19
title Attacks on Health Care Workers in Historical Pandemics and COVID-19
title_full Attacks on Health Care Workers in Historical Pandemics and COVID-19
title_fullStr Attacks on Health Care Workers in Historical Pandemics and COVID-19
title_full_unstemmed Attacks on Health Care Workers in Historical Pandemics and COVID-19
title_short Attacks on Health Care Workers in Historical Pandemics and COVID-19
title_sort attacks on health care workers in historical pandemics and covid-19
topic Concepts in Disaster Medicine
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9947042/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36474406
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/dmp.2022.275
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