MORNING SERIAL
HIS comments are quite extensive and are USA focussed but they apply to the situation in Wales as well.
He said: “I’ve been reflecting on the tumult last week over how to support the BLM protests while still supporting social distancing. A lot of critics argued that I and others were ‘conflating medical and professional expertise with other political beliefs, damaging [our] credibility.’
“With the benefit of some distance and reflection, I want to address that again. I’ll start with a quick story.
“Just over a year ago I traveled to Eastern Congo to assess WHO’s work on the Ebola outbreak there. I went to Butembo, then the epicenter of the outbreak.
“Much of E. Congo has been at war for years. In Butembo I met with leaders of local NGOs and civil society. Amazingly, 200 people showed up for a small meeting. Packed the room. And they didn’t want to talk about Ebola. They wanted to talk about safety.
“Speaker, after speaker, after speaker talked about safety and security. ‘Why didn’t the government and UN care about insecurity here before Ebola arrived’?. ‘Why did you send peacekeepers to protect Ebola teams, but not to protect us from conflict’? (Applause).
“In their minds – understandably – Ebola was not the biggest threat to their safety. Conflict and insecurity were – and had been endangering them much longer than Ebola.
“We spent a lot of time talking about that. My rusty French got a workout. But they needed me to hear them on that before they were ready to dialog on Ebola.
“We ended up talking for two hours before I finally had to head off. There’s a lesson in that. People who feel fundamentally unsafe and unheard will probably care about that more than a virus. Black Americans have been fundamentally unsafe in this country since before its founding. And public health officials have no grounds to tell them that legacy should come second to the virus. Both are valid public health crises. Both threaten lives. Both need to be solved.”
> Lockdown Wales by Will Hayward £9.99 www.serenbooks.com/ productdisplay/lockdown-wales ISBN 9781781726013