In her bookThe Path of a Pandemic,Laura Garrett wrote:
We live in a globalized world, filled with shared microbial threatsthat arise in one place, are amplified somewhere elsethroughhuman activities that aid and abet the germs, andthen traversevast geographic terrain in days, even hours—again, thanks tohuman activities and movements.
Garrett then says, that if there is anyone who should be blamed, it should be the species Homo sapiens (i.e. humans), and the many different ways in which we arereshaping the world ecology, offering germs like the influenza virus extraordinary new opportunities to evolve, mutate and spread.
1.Was Laura Garrett right? Are human patterns of behavior behind the rise and spread of infectious disease? Why or why not?
Watch this short video and answer these 2 questions.
https://topdocumentaryfilms.com/coming-pandemic/
2.What is the film about?
3.What does this film tell us about the relationship between human actions and dying from an infectious disease? Use one of the cases discussed to support your answer.
4.How do capitalist practices foster the emergence and spread of infectious disease? Identify and describe at least ONE example.