I would say that the perspectives of the government as well as first responders were not included in this film. They were not able to communicate the stresses as well as the lack of resources and man power. There were no viewpoints from first responders or volunteers, having that testimony would have more accurately depicted the hardships that first responders and aid were facing.
The main focus of this article was on chronic disaster syndrome, or the psychological and physiological effects generated by the disruptions caused by a disaster, or specifically in this article, Hurricane Katrina. The effects of long term stress related to loss of family, shelter, community and jobs are analyzed. In this article individual suffering based off chronic trauma and long term displacement, disaster capitalism tied to social welfare and the ways the displacement function within the disaster capitalism are discussed in this article.
This film appeals to the viewers from an emotional aspect. The documentary follows a family and is told from the father's perspective, a student from Wisconsin. It shows a first person experience of what it was like to deal with this situation and the climate and magnitude of the situation in Liberia. The documentary isn't scientific or statistics heavy. Rather it has testimony from natives of the area and footage of bodies and the lack of hospital effectiveness and government protocol. The stories and narratives from locals is what really captures the attention of viewers and accurately portrays the hardships faced. There were a few parts at the end where numbers of those infected were mentioned, yet the the narrator's account of what occurred as well as other local's stories is what really drives home the point of anguish and despair seen during those hard times in Africa.
This article has been referenced in dozens of other papers on the topic of Katrina recovery and the effects the disaster had on its survivors. One of which is cited below:
Adams, Vincanne et al. “Aging Disaster: Mortality, Vulnerability, and Long-Term Recovery Among Katrina Survivors.” Medical anthropology 30.3 (2011): 247–270. PMC. Web. 10 Oct. 2016.
There are far more articles that have cited this specific work, many of them having to do with Katrina disaster recovery specifically, as well as preventative measures or vulnerabilities that the area had pre hurricane. It is also important to note that the article is also discussed by numerous governmental agencies as well.
I would say the average community member is the main intended audience of this documentary, due to the fact that those in the general public can see themselves as being in the same situation. Most of those in the public aren't medically educated and the responses seen in Libera is the same that many of those would have in other general populations of other countries and locations. Due to the lack of scientific research and statistical analysis in the documentary, I would say that this documentary was meant to appeal to the general average person and not scientists, scholars or experts on the topic of disease containment.
Vincanne Adams is a PhD at UCSF School of Medicine, she's the former Director and Vice-Chair of Medical Anthropology and History and Social Medicine. Her areas of research and publications include: Global Health, Asian Medical Systems, Social Theory, Critical Medical Anthropology, Sexuality and Gender, Safe Motherhood and Disaster Recovery, Tibet, Nepal, China and the US. Van Hattum works at the Louisiana Public Health Institute and Diana English is a professor at Stanford hospital. They all deal with populations that are effected my disaster and are disadvantaged economically and socially.
The main point and argument of this film is to demonstrate the importance of public health education and protocols for both the public and those in charge or part of the government. The documentary focuses on the West African Ebola outbreak. Specifically, the struggles of Liberia are demonstrated and portrayed. The outbreak proved to be something that the government wasn't able to fully contain and protect citizens from. The fact that this outbreak occurred right after the end of a 14 year long civil war also proved to be an obstacle. The documentary shows the uneducated, misinformed lack of effort to contain, stop or cure the spread of disease or to even inform those that were infected. There was a complete lack of awareness on diseases in general, Ebola specifically and of protocols to enact when faced with this issue demonstrated by the government.
Emergency response is addressed in different ways in this article. In terms of true emergency response during and immediately following the disaster, examples of emergency response can be seen in the recounting of those that were interviewed, but they weren't explicitly discussed in the article. The article does however extensively discuss aid that followed the disaster and discusses that aspect of emergency response, and more so the recovery and resiliency aspects of it. Such as government funding, aid relief, conditions in which things were left, hardships that those who survived came back and had to deal with, how medical care, socioeconomic factors and much more were highly effected post Katrina.
I found aspects involving the governments response to the situation very unconvincing. I would like to have seen more in the documentary about the government's attempts to inform and the actions they took. This may have been due to a lack of efforts taken by the government. Yet seeing more about the government's involvement as well as the hospital's and doctor's would have made that side of the situation far more compelling. The way it was portrayed in the documentary made it very unconvincing and I was not compelled by it.
-I looked up UN response efforts in Liberia during the time of this outbreak. Doing this, I was able to learn about the process that was taken in an attempt to decrease the transmission of the disease. I also learned about specific numbers in terms of confirmed cases as well as deaths. The UN was mentioned but not explicitly talked about in the film, so I wanted to further my understanding of the actions and role they played during this outbreak.
http://ebolaresponse.un.org/liberia
-I wanted to research the general healthcare in Libera and see if there is a lack in healthcare in this area, which may have aided in the severe devastation caused by the outbreak. As mentioned, the civil war really effected many outcomes of the country, one of them being healthcare. Communicable diseases were a factor that was already a topic of concern in this area before the outbreak of Ebola. Currently healthcare in Libera is being reformed, yet after reading this report, it is easy to see why the government and public health workers struggled so much to contain this outbreak.
https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/legacy_files/files/publi…
-I wanted to learn more about the Ebola virus in general but also learn more about the diagnosis and the symptoms that those infected would display. I also wanted to learn more about the progression of the virus after being infected as well as the incubation period. I researched the virus on the World Health Organization website. Here I was able to find all this information out from the virus' origin to the diagnoses process and symptoms.