In the Media: Calculus of Reopening, "Mask Police," Privacy and Covid Testing
Hastings Center president Mildred Solomon urged political leaders to stop thinking of reopening the economy as a tradeoff between saving lives or jobs. “We humans like to think in either or, black and white,” she said in an interview with Newsday. “We say, 'we think that we have to trade off between economic well being and health,' when in fact they are very intertwined … the goal should be to solve a problem that takes into account all the different things we have to consider and recognizes interrelationships between economic and health well being.” Read the Newsday article.
Scolding people for not wearing masks in public or failing to remain six feet apart – public shaming has become common during the pandemic. In an interview with CNN, Hastings Center research scholar Nancy Berlinger said that messaging on when and how to wear masks needs to be clearer. “In these everyday interactions with masks, should everyone be turning themselves into the mask police?” she said. “Or should we absolutely make sure that everyone understands why this is important, how to do it, where to get masks and figure out friendly ways of encouraging each other?” She added that shaming people who aren’t following the rules could align with people’s biases about who does things wrong in society. Read the CNN article.
Hastings Center research scholar Michael Gusmano discussed concerns about the personal data that is collected by Covid testing sites and who has access to it. “Pop up community-based testing sites are playing an important role but there are a lot of parties touching people’s information,” he said in an interview with the South Florida Sun Sentinel. He said that standardizing how information is collected, reported, and analyzed is needed to raise public comfort levels. “The last thing we want to do is discourage people form getting tested, which is going to be one of the main tools for controlling this virus.” Read the Sun Sentinel article.
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