The Covid‐19 pandemic has highlighted many of the difficult ethical issues that health care professionals confront in caring for patients and families. The decisions such workers face on the front lines are fraught with uncertainty for all stakeholders. Our focus is on the implications for nurses, who are the largest global health care workforce but whose perspectives are not always fully considered. This essay discusses three overarching ethical issues that create a myriad of concerns and will likely affect nurses (...) globally in unique ways: the safety of nurses, patients, colleagues, and families; the allocation of scarce resources; and the changing nature of nurses’ relationships with patients and families. We urge policy‐makers to ensure that nurses’ voices and perspectives are integrated into both local and global decision‐making so as to minimize the structural injustices many nurses have faced to date. Finally, we urge nurses to seek sources of support throughout this pandemic. (shrink)

The global spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) or coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) has led to the imposition of severely restrictive measures by governments in the Western hemisphere. We feel a contrast between these measures and our freedom. This contrast, we argue, is a false perception. It only appears to us because we look at the issue through our contemporary moral philosophy of utilitarianism and an understanding of freedom as absence of constraints. Both these views can (...) be substituted with more sophisticated alternatives, namely an ethics of virtue and a notion of freedom of the will. These offer a fuller picture of morality and enable us to cooperate with the current restrictions by consciously choosing to adhere to them instead of perceiving them as draconian and immoral. We ask whether we should collaborate with the restrictions and argue that considerations of virtue will lead to an affirmative answer. More broadly, virtue ethics permits to deal with the practical concerns about how an individual should behave during this pandemic, given the current lockdown measures or lack thereof. -/- In section 1, we present how utilitarianism and a notion of freedom as negative liberty support the opposition to restrictive measures. In section 2, we outline an alternative based on an ethics of virtue and a more elaborated notion of free will. In the concluding section 3, we argue that considerations of virtue should guide the individual and public response to the emergency. (shrink)

Governments around the world have faced the challenge of how to respond to the recent outbreak of a novel coronavirus disease. Some have reacted by greatly restricting the freedom of citizens, while others have opted for less drastic policies. In this paper, I draw a parallel with vaccination ethics to conceptualize two distinct approaches to COVID-19 that I call altruistic and lockdown. Given that the individual measures necessary to limit the spread of the virus can in principle be achieved (...) voluntarily as well as through enforcement, the question arises of how much freedom governments ought to give citizens to adopt the required measures. I argue that an altruistic approach is preferable on moral grounds: it preserves important citizen freedoms, avoids a number of potential injustices, and gives people a much-needed sense of meaning in precarious times. (shrink)

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the academe was introduced to online education, which is complicated. The sudden shift of traditional face-to-face classes to digital learning impacted every student's self-efficacy and motivation towards their studies. This study investigates the relationship between the self-efficacy and academic motivation of the 304 freshmen college students from private higher education institutions in the Philippines. Based on the data gathered, the participants' level of self-efficacy (x̄ = 3.27) and academic motivation (x̄ = 5.93) is high. (...) Further, the statistical analysis concluded a relationship between self-efficacy and academic motivation (r=.002, at 0.05 level) among the graduating college students. Implications of the study were discussed, and recommendations for future research were suggested. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis article addresses the question of whether certain experiences that originate in causes other than bereavement are properly termed ‘grief’. To do so, we focus on widespread experiences of grief that have been reported during the Covid-19 pandemic. We consider two potential objections to a more permissive use of the term: grief is, by definition, a response to a death; grief is subject to certain norms that apply only to the case of bereavement. Having shown that these objections are (...) unconvincing, we sketch a positive case for a conception of grief that is not specific to bereavement, by noting some features that grief following bereavement shares with other experiences of loss. (shrink)

La crise sanitaire et sociale provoquée par la Covid-19 a été surmontée par des dispositions qui relèvent autant d’une logique de précaution que de prévention. En effet, la certitude liée à l’existence de ce virus n’a pas suffi à lever toutes les zones d’ombre sur son traitement. Au moins au début de la crise, c’est l’existence même d’un risque qui pouvait être discutée. En conséquence, les dispositions adoptées, sous la menace de sanctions pénales, relèvent en partie d’une logique de (...) précaution dont l’analyse appelle des commentaires mitigés. Il en va a fortiori de même pour l’usage des qualifications de droit commun qui s’avèrent inadaptées. (shrink)

The COVID-19 crisis opened up discussions on using online tools and platforms for academic work, e.g. for research (management) events that were originally designed as face-to-face interactions. As social scientists working in the domain of responsible research and innovation (RRI), we draft this paper to open up a dialogue on Responsible online Research and Innovation (RoRI), and deliberate particular socioethical opportunities and challenges of the onlineification in collaborative theoretical and empirical research. An RRI-inspired ‘going online’ approach would mean, we (...) suggest, trying to make academic events and research activities more inclusive, researchers’ attitude to their work more reflective and suggest processes that are more responsive to societal needs and ethical concerns. For such systematic reflection, we suggest using the RRI-heuristic provided by Owen et al., and applying the dimensions of ‘Anticipation, Inclusion, Reflection and Responsiveness’ (AIRR) in order to identify and reflect on the dilemmas involved in ‘going online’ in one’s research. (shrink)

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has brought science to the fore of public discourse and, considering the complexity of the issues involved, with it also the challenge of effective and informative science communication. This is a particularly contentious topic, in that it is both highly emotional in and of itself; sits at the nexus of the decision-making process regarding the handling of the pandemic, which has effected lockdowns, social behaviour measures, business closures, and others; and concerns the recording and reporting (...) of disease mortality. To clarify a point that has caused much controversy and anger in the public debate, the first part of the present article discusses the very fundamentals underlying the issue of causative attribution with regards to mortality, lays out the foundations of the statistical means of mortality estimation, and concretizes these by analysing the recording and reporting practices adopted in England and their widespread misrepresentations. The second part of the article is empirical in nature. I present data and an analysis of how COVID-19 mortality has been reported in the mainstream media in the UK and the USA, including a comparative analysis both across the two countries as well as across different media outlets. The findings clearly demonstrate a uniform and worrying lack of understanding of the relevant technical subject matter by the media in both countries. Of particular interest is the finding that with a remarkable regularity (????>0.998), the greater the number of articles a media outlet has published on COVID-19 mortality, the greater the proportion of its articles misrepresented the disease mortality figures. (shrink)

Undoubtedly and unfortunately, COVID-19 pandemic has been politicized in media see Abbas, Rui Zhang. Although vaccines play a crucial role in eliminating the pandemic, they have been politicized by media. This article aims to show how COVID-19 vaccines are politicized in the press. The article collects some selected reports on vaccines taken from American and Chinese media. The reports are analyzed according to an analytical framework suggested by the researcher. The framework and data collection and description are clearly (...) presented in the method section. Based on data analysis, the article shows that COVID-19 vaccines have been politicized. The study recommends that diseases and vaccines should not be politicized. In other words, we should respect and trust science and our scientists for no other purpose than to reach herd immunity and overcome a dangerous pandemic that has taken and is still taking thousands of innocent lives. (shrink)

COVID-19 continues to dominate 2020 and is likely to be a feature of our lives for some time to come. Given this, how should health systems respond ethically to the persistent challenges of responding to the ongoing impact of the pandemic? Relatedly, what ethical values should underpin the resetting of health services after the initial wave, knowing that local spikes and further waves now seem inevitable? In this editorial, we outline some of the ethical challenges confronting those running health (...) services as they try to resume non-COVID-related services, and the downstream ethical implications these have for healthcare professionals’ day-to-day decision making. This is a phase of recovery, resumption and renewal; a form of reset for health services.1 This reset phase will define the ‘new normal' for healthcare delivery, and it offers an opportunity to reimagine and change services for the better. There are difficulties, however, healthcare systems are already weakened by austerity and the first wave of COVID-19 and remain under stress as the pandemic continues. The reset period is operating alongside, rather than at the end, of the pandemic and this creates difficult ethical choices. ### Balancing the greater good with individual care Pandemics—and public health emergencies more generally—reinforce approaches to ethics that emphasise or derive from the interests of communities, rather than those grounded in the claims of the autonomous individual. The response has been to draw on more public health focused ethics, ‘if demand outstrips the ability to deliver to existing standards, more strictly utilitarian considerations will have to be applied, and decisions about how to meet the individual's need will give way to decisions about how to maximise overall benefit’.2 Alongside this, effective …. (shrink)

What the COVID-19 pandemic serves to reveal is the inherent limitations and contradictions of a symbolic order that must now be perceived via an “impossible subjectivity”: what this essay will refer to as the “in-human.” (Zizek, 2020). Indeed, this in-human perspective transpires not through our fetishization of the virus, as some form of justification for humanity’s impact on the world, but from a position of impossibility that renders “the whole situation into which we are included.” (Monbiot, 2020; Zizek, 2020). (...) It is on this basis that the virus confers a confrontation with the Real: an antagonism steered by the isolation of an “impossible phenomenon,” grounded in a certain level of “disengagement” that obliges us to “perceive reality as it were viewed from outside.” (Zizek, 2020). Importantly, this “view from outside” does not—and now, cannot—avoid our engagement with the impossible, but must instead be rendered via a form of approachment that conceives of the “virus” as an in-human phenomenon that is our universal condition. The following sections will serve to clarify this in-human approach. (shrink)

Previous research has shown that women are disproportionately negatively affected by a variety of socio-economic hardships, many of which COVID-19 is making worse. In particular, because of gender roles, and because women’s jobs tend to be given lower priority than men’s (since they are more likely to be part-time, lower-income, and less secure), women assume the obligations of increased caregiving needs at a much higher rate. This unfairly renders women especially susceptible to short- and long-term economic insecurity and decreases (...) in wellbeing. Single-parent households, the majority of which are headed by single mothers, face even greater risks. These vulnerabilities are further compounded along the dimensions of race, ethnicity, class, and geography. Drawing upon the philosophical literature on political responsibility and structural injustice (specifically, the work of Iris Marion Young), I argue that while the state may not have had either foresight into, or control over, the disproportionate effect the pandemic would have on women, it can nonetheless be held responsible for mitigating these effects. In order to do so, it must first recognize the ways in which women have been affected by the outbreak. Specifically, policies must take into account the unpaid labor of care that falls on women. Moreover, given that this labor is particularly vital during a global health pandemic, the state ought to immediately prioritize the value of this work by providing financial stimuli directly to families, requiring employers to provide both sick leave and parental leave for at least as long as schools and daycares are inoperational, and providing subsidized emergency childcare. (shrink)

Is there such a thing as corona solidarity? Does voluntary mutual aid solve the problems caused by COVID-19? I argue that the answer to the first question is “yes” and to the second “no.” Not that the answer to the second question could not, in an ideal world, be “yes,” too. It is just that in this world of global capitalism and everybody looking out for themselves, the kind of communal warmth celebrated by the media either does not actually (...) exist or is too weak to rule out the uglier manifestations of group togetherness, driven partly by the pandemic. I make my point by offering two approaches to understanding what solidarity is. According to the first, it is essentially partiality: “us” against “them.” According to the second, it can be many things, including the impartial promotion of the good of others. I show that the second reading would make it possible for mutual aid to solve the problems caused by COVID-19 and other crises. This would happen at the expense of conceptual clarity, but that is a minor concern. The major concern is that the more natural manifestations of group togetherness are incited by negative feelings. This is par for the course within the narrower reading of solidarity, but it means that the potentially positive ideas of identity, care, communal values, and special relations are displayed in violent confrontation instead of a calm recognition of the threats that most of us face together. (shrink)

A COVID-19 vaccine mandate is being introduced for health and social care workers in England, and those refusing to comply will either be redeployed or have their employment terminated. We argue th...

The rare but severe cerebral venous thrombosis occurring in some AstraZeneca vaccine recipients has prompted some governments to suspend part of their COVID-19 vaccination programmes. Such suspensions have faced various challenges from both scientific and ethical angles. Most of the criticisms against such suspensions follow a consequentialist approach, arguing that the suspension will lead to more harm than benefits. In this paper, I propose a rights-based argument against the suspension of the vaccine rollouts amid this highly time-sensitive combat of (...) COVID-19. I argue that by suspending a vaccine rollout, a government infringes people's right to take the risks they deem worth taking for their health. I also consider four potential objections to my argument and explain why none of them undermines my argument. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic which started in China in 2019, was originally described as a public health emergency of intercontinental concern by the World Health Organization (WHO) in January 2020. Due to its speedy rate of spread, the WHO then declared it a pandemic after 6 weeks. The global spread of COVID-19 has been attributed to the high mobility between and within countries. Having noted the wide spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, almost every country affected, developed strict and (...) restrictive public health measures to control the spread of the virus. Such measures included restrictions on country borders and social gatherings. Hence, the main purpose of the paper was to explore the impact of the COVID-19 crisis in relation to religion, health and poverty in Harare urban communities as well as determining solutions to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on those sectors. The research methodology was qualitative in nature. Primary data were collected through in-depth telephone interviews and online open-ended questionnaires. Purposive sampling was used to select the study participants. The findings showed that the COVID-19 pandemic triggered and exposed the inequalities in health. The pandemic also had a strong impact on religious activities and it exacerbated poverty levels as well. Those who had all the access to medication, food and vaccinations during the height of COVID-19 may not fully appreciate the impact that poverty coupled with pandemics left on their communities both religiously and socially. Malnutrition, hunger and sickness were the order of the day among the poor.Contribution: The conclusion was that COVID-19 negatively impacted on the health, religious and social sectors. Therefore, it is critical to maintain preventive and curative services, especially for the most vulnerable populations such as children, older persons, and people with disabilities. (shrink)

This article approaches the COVID-19 pandemic as an inherently antagonistic phenomenon. To do so, it carries forward the philosophical contentions that Žižek outlines in his Pandemic! COVID-19 Shakes the World, as well as his wider work. With reference to the parallax Real and McGowan’s Hegelian contradiction, it is demonstrated that Žižek’s philosophical premises hold a unique importance in politically confronting COVID-19. Indeed, by drawing specific attention to the various ways in which our confrontations with the Real expose (...) the limitations of our socio-ideological orders, it is argued that it is in these very limitations that the limits of the Real are transposed through the various “fictions” we employ to fight and perceive it. In outlining this confrontation, a focused discussion on the Real as “impossible” – a “characteristic” that affords an important political significance for the present context and its ongoing limitations – is provided. In conclusion, if the COVID-19 pandemic demands a new “commons”, and if our response to the crisis should be one where the desires of the nation-state are regulated and controlled, then, it may not simply be enough that we “demand the impossible”. Instead, it is today that the impossible demands a new “us”. (shrink)

As governments around the world imposed lockdowns or stay-at-home measures, people began to feel the stress as time dragged on. There were already reports on some individuals committing suicide. How do governments respond to such a phenomenon? Our main focus is the Philippine government and how it responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. In this paper, we argue that the problem with COVID-19 went forth just dealing with physical health. First, people suffer not just from being infected but the (...) psychological stress of possibly getting the virus and the toll of the government lockdown or quarantine. Second, the Philippine Bayanihan ‘We Heal As One Act’ lacks focus on mental health issues while the government's response seemed to focus on security issues. Third, there are countries around the world that have acted effectively in protecting people’s mental health. Lastly, we propose appropriate measures to help address the people's mental health while still in the pandemic and for a future one. (shrink)

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) first appeared in China in late 2019 and since then it has become a pandemic. Various countries, in accordance with their cultures, have adopted different approaches to deal with the spread of this disease. The dimensions of this disease and its global spread are such that it will certainly have enormous effects on various aspects of human life for many years. One of these issues is examining the approach of religious countries in dealing with this (...) crisis. The issue of science and religion is one of the main issues in the philosophy of religion. A historical event that human society is struggling with today is the COVID-19 crisis. The issues of religion and science were intertwined during the COVID-19 outbreak, contrary to what some thought. This shows that the opposition between religion and science is not real but aims to attack religion without a valid reason. Given the importance of the subject, this article addresses two aspects of people’s exposure to religion during the COVID-19 period. On the one hand, the researchers’ field observations indicate that group of citizens has turned towards religious teachings since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis. On the other hand, another group of citizens have distanced themselves from religiosity, raising the duality of science and religion.Contribution: This article describes the dual attitude of citizens towards religiosity due to the occurrence of COVID-19, which has not been previously considered in research. (shrink)

Trans healthcare and thus trans people have been severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Trans people’s healthcare situations have turned out to be so vulnerable in this crisis because they have been precarious to begin with. There are multiple ways in which trans healthcare has been affected: Surgeries and other procedures have been cancelled or postponed, and mental health services have been paused or moved online. This raises ethical questions around discrimination against trans people in the healthcare system. This (...) article argues that cancelling trans surgeries and procedures in the COVID-19 crisis is made possible through an understanding of trans healthcare as non-essential. The article explores how trans healthcare in particular has been affected by the pandemic. (shrink)

This monograph evaluates public policy responses to the Covid-19 pandemic through a public choice lens. The book compares two prominent, albeit mutually exclusive, theories in social sciences—public interest theory and public choice theory—and explores how their predictions perform within the framework of the Covid-19 pandemic. The chapters present different pandemic policies alongside empirical data in order to draw conclusions about their efficacy, and, in turn, draw conclusions about the veracity of each theory. By the end of the volume, (...) the reader will be able to draw their own conclusions about whether the pandemic policy responses served the public interest, as public interest theory suggests, or the personal interests of the politicians who implemented them, as public choice theory holds. (shrink)

This article discusses the triage response to the COVID-19 delta variant surge of 2021. One issue that distinguishes the delta wave from earlier surges is that by the time it became the predominant strain in the USA in July 2021, safe and effective vaccines against COVID-19 had been available for all US adults for several months. We consider whether healthcare professionals and triage committees would have been justified in prioritising patients with COVID-19 who are vaccinated above those (...) who are unvaccinated in first-order or second-order triage. Given that lack of evidence for a correlation between short-term survival and vaccination, we argue that using vaccination status during first-order triage would be inconsistent with accepted triage standards. We then turn to notions of procedural fairness, equity and desert to argue that that there is also a lack of justification for using vaccination status in second-order triage. In planning for future surges, we recommend that medical institutions base their triage decisions on principles meant to save the most lives, minimise inequity and protect the public’s trust, which for the time being would not be served by the inclusion of vaccination status. (shrink)

The article entitled “Post-COVID-19: Education and Thai Society in Digital Era” has two objectives: 1) to study digital technology 2) to study the living life in Thailand in the digital era after COVID-19 pandemics. According to the study, it was found that the new digitized service is a service process on digital platforms such as ordering food, hailing a taxi, and online trading. It is a service called via smartphone. The information is used digitally. Public relations, digital marketing, (...) and living in cyberspace play an increasingly digital role. People have communication skills, use Line, Facebook, social media, have tools to search for knowledge, learn and improve themselves. People in the new era of life have a new way of life therefore there is social life in the cyber world. There should be ethics, attitudes, values, and click-on images that are linked to digital use. For a good time life, It is important to have digital intelligence (Digital Quotient) to live after post-COVID19, the digital era. (shrink)

In this article, our objective was to analyze the emotions expressed regarding the Covid-19 vaccine in content published in Brazilian Portuguese on TikTok, a video sharing platform that has recently experienced global popularity. Our data set for this investigation was comprised of posts including the hashtag #vacina (vaccine), extracted using the Python TikTokAPI library. Emotions were identified and classified using standardized descriptors from the Human-Machine Interaction Network on Emotion (HUMAINE) and the Core Affect Model. Given the diversity of content (...) on TikTok, videos with emotional content were also separated into categories. Results revealed a prevalence of positive emotions such as contentment, enthusiasm, and interest regarding the vaccines, especially in videos of a personal and informative character. Negative emotions, such as doubt and disapproval, were associated with contextual and strategic factors, with significant expression in humorous and infotainment publications. (shrink)

The Covid-19 crisis is testing human societies. It is obviously first and foremost a health problem – it causes deaths and numerous diseases – but it is also an economic problem – it is expensive, it weighs on the usual economic functioning – and finally, it is a hindrance to freedom – circulation, sociality, vaccination, etc. – and to the development of the human condition. This crisis highlights the interdependence between the environment, the economy and freedom, and reveals our (...) condition and its future. (shrink)

The pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV2 novel coronavirus is creating a global crisis. There is a global ambience of uncertainty and anxiety. In addition, nations have imposed strict and restrictive public health measures including lockdowns. In this heightened time of vulnerability, public cooperation to preventive measures depends on trust and confidence in the health system. Trust is the optimistic acceptance of the vulnerability in the belief that the health system has best intentions. On the other hand, confidence is assessed based (...) on previous experiences with the health system. Trust and confidence in the health system motivate people to accept the public health interventions and cooperate with them. Building trust and confidence therefore becomes an ethical imperative. This article analyses the COVID-19 pandemic in the south Indian state of Tamil Nadu and the state’s response to this pandemic. Further, it applies the Trust-Confidence-Cooperation framework of risk management to analyse the influence of public trust and confidence on the Tamil Nadu health system in the context of the preventive strategies adopted by the state. Finally, the article proposes a six-pronged strategy to build trust and confidence in health system functions to improve cooperation to pandemic containment measures. (shrink)

The key problems and challenges connected with the Covid-19 pandemic in the field of education in sub-Saharan Africa are described in this paper. The study is based on the information collected from teachers and parents during the lockdown. The main problems connected with the organization of distance learning, such as the availability and accessibility of electricity and stable communications, were described. The main questions connected with the support of e-learning such as unequal access to distance education platforms and tools (...) and readiness of teachers of public and private schools were described. Key social and demographic challenges and threats to sustainable e-learning, such as critical overload of teachers, child mobilization for domestic tasks, age, ethnic and gender-based harassment and violence were analyzed. It was found that the main risks are the rapid and uncontrolled commercialization of education and the decline of public schools, which leads to a decrease in the quality of education and increasing inequality. It was concluded that pandemic-induced risks in education are non-linear and heterogeneously spatially, temporally, and socially distributed. The successful strategy of these risks reduction aimed at sustainable education should be based on transition plans, which must include not only the development of sustainable education but also the fighting against inequality. (shrink)

Background and Aims: The COVID-19 pandemic has led to radical and unexpected changes in everyday life, and it is plausible that people’s psychophysical health has been affected. This study examined the relationship between COVID-19 related knowledge and mental health in a Croatian sample of participants.MethodsAn online survey was conducted from March 18 until March 23, 2020, and a total of 1244 participant responses were collected. Measures included eight questions regarding biological features of the virus, symptoms, and prevention, the (...) Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, and Optimism-Pessimism Scale. According to the answers given on the questions on COVID-19 related knowledge, participants were divided in two groups: informed and uninformed on each question. They were then compared in the expressed levels of anxiety, depression, pessimism, and optimism. Full vs. partial mediation models with optimism/pessimism as a mediator in the relationship between anxiety/depression and the accuracy of responses for questions about handwashing and ways of transmission were estimated.ResultsParticipants who responded correctly on the question about handwashing had higher levels of anxiety, depression, and pessimism than those participants whose answer was incorrect, while participants who answered correctly on the question about the percentage of patients who develop serious breathing problems had higher levels of depression than those who answered incorrectly. Lower levels of anxiety and pessimism were observed in the participants who answered correctly about ways of transmission. Higher levels of pessimism were found in participants who scored incorrectly on questions about the efficiency of antibiotics, most common symptoms, and the possibility of being infected by asymptomatic carriers. Higher levels of knowledge about handwashing were predicted by higher levels of anxiety and pessimism. Higher levels of knowledge about ways of transmission were predicted by lower levels of anxiety and lower levels of pessimism. The examined relationships between anxiety/depression and knowledge were mediated by pessimism.ConclusionThe findings of this study suggest that knowledge about COVID-19 may be useful to reduce anxiety and depression, but it must be directed to the promotion of health behaviors and to the recognition of fake news. (shrink)

Studies on mental health and academic performance have been conducted throughout the world. Thus, this study aims to assess the students' mental health amidst the new normal of education employing 21-item Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale or DASS-21, concerning their academic performance. The study's findings showed that almost more than half of the respondents suffered from moderate to extremely severe levels of depression, stress, and anxiety. Thus, there was no significant relationship between high negative mental health symptoms and academic performance. (...) In conclusion, students that encounter extreme levels of adverse mental health can still maintain high academic achievement. However, the students' mental health should always be managed and helped to cope with their life problems, especially during this pandemic crisis. (shrink)

The COVID-19 challenge is unprecedented. It has caused enormous trauma, disrupted economies, social life, mass transportation, work and employment, supply chains, leisure, sport, international relations, academic programmes; literally everything. Churches and religious communities have not been spared; they have been severely affected and, in all likelihood, permanently transformed by the pandemic. The pre-COVID-19 world is gone, replaced by a ‘new normal’. The new landscape calls for both resilience and adaptation, embracing new ways of doing things and of being (...) church. Churches have to adapt; they have to ask themselves questions about the implications for being church in this ‘new normal’ context. This article aims to explore the impact of the coronavirus on the mission and theology of the church. (shrink)

In general, existential threats are those that may potentially result in the extinction of the entire human species, if not significantly endanger its living population. Among the said threats include, but not limited to, pandemics and the impacts of a technological singularity. As regards pandemics, significant work has already been done on how to mitigate, if not prevent, the aftereffects of this type of disaster. For one, certain problem areas on how to properly manage pandemic responses have already been identified, (...) like the following: (a) not being able to learn from previous experiences, (b) the inability to act on warning signals, and (c) the failure to reach a global consensus on a problem (i.e., in a timely manner). In terms of a singularity, however, it may be said that further research is still needed, specifically on how to aptly respond to its projected negative outcomes. In this paper, by treating the three problem areas noted above as preliminary assessment measures of a country’s capacity to coordinate a national response to large-scale disasters, we examine the readiness of the Philippines in preparing for an intelligence explosion. By citing certain instances of how the said country, specifically its national government, faced the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic, it puts forward the idea that the likely Philippine disaster response towards a singularity needs to be worked on, appealing for a more comprehensive assessment of such for a more informed response plan. (shrink)

In many countries, the COVID-19 pandemic led to a period of lockdown that impacted individuals’ lifestyles, in both professional and personal spheres. New problems and challenges arose, as well as opportunities. Numerous studies have examined the negative effects of lockdown measures, but few have attempted to shine light on the potential positive effects that may come out of these measures. We focused on one particular positive outcome that might have emerged from lockdown: creativity. To this end, this paper compared (...) self-reported professional creativity and everyday creativity before and during lockdown, using a questionnaire-based study conducted on a French sample. We expected participants to be more creative during than prior to lockdown, in both professional and everyday spheres. Regarding Pro-C, we did not see any significant differences between the two comparison points, before and during lockdown. Regarding everyday creativity, we observed a significant increase during lockdown. Furthermore, our results suggest that participants with a lower baseline creativity benefited more from the situation than those with a higher initial baseline creativity. Our results provide new insights on the impact of lockdown and its positive outcomes. These measures may have inarguably negative consequences on the physical and mental health of many, but their positive impact exists as well. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic may affect the world severely in terms of quality of life, political, environmental, and economic sustainable development, and the global economy. Its impact is attested to by the number of research studies on it. The main aim of this study is to evaluate the impact of COVID-19 on the psychology of sustainability, on sustainable development, and on the global economy. A computerized literature search was performed, and journal articles from authentic sources were extracted, including MEDLINE, (...) Google Scholar, Science Direct, ProQuest, and Emerald Insight. The references in selected articles were screened to identify any relevant studies. The following inclusion criteria were followed: research articles based on the COVID-19 pandemic, and articles, research papers, journals, and news articles published 2010 to 2020. The exclusion criteria were as follow: psychology research, articles, and journals published before 2010 and research articles having no link with the current pandemic’s impact on the psychology of sustainability, quality of life, and the global economy. Of the initial 350 articles identified, only 61 studies were found to be relevant and meet the inclusion criteria. Based on these articles, the review highlights that compared to developed countries, the developing nations and poor nations such as African countries with compromised health structures have been greatly affected. There are close associations between health, economic, environmental, and political issues globally. The pandemic can be managed if we follow new policies that implement economic and public health changes worldwide. A planned, coordinated approach between the public-private sector is required, designed according to each country’s health system and economy. We can come out of this crisis if we work together and support both developed and developing nations. (shrink)

By 20 October 2021, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had amended its Emergency Use Authorizations for immunocompetent adults who previously received the Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, or Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccines. For the 2-dose Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, the FDA permitted a single booster dose for adults aged 65 years or older and adults aged 18 to 64 years at high-risk for severe COVID-19 or at high risk for occupational or institutional COVID-19 exposure. For the single-dose (...) Johnson & Johnson vaccine, the FDA permitted a single booster dose for all adults aged 18 or older. These eligibility schemes were endorsed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shortly after FDA approval. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic provided an opportunity for management scholars to address large-scale and complex societal problems and strive for greater practical and policy impact. A brief overview of the most-cited work on COVID-19 reveals that, compared with their counterparts in other disciplines, leading management journals and professional associations lagged in providing a platform for high-impact research on COVID-19. To help management research play a more active role in responding to similar global challenges in the future, we propose (...) an integrative framework that emphasizes a phenomenon’s impact, the conditions that the phenomenon creates at multiple levels, and the responses of actors to such conditions, as well as the dynamic relationships and interactions among these actors. By shifting attention to phenomena and their overall impact, this framework can help scholars better position their work to address large-scale and complex problems and also to assess research for its contribution to generate impact beyond academia. (shrink)

Uncertainty around the role ‘super-spreaders’ play in the transmission and escalation of infectious disease is compounded by its broad and vague definition. It is a term that has been much used in relation to COVID-19, particularly in social media. On its widest definition, it refers to a propensity to infect a larger than average number of people. Given the biological, behavioural and environmental variables relevant to infectivity, this might be pertinent to almost any infected individual who is not physically (...) isolated from others. Nor is the term confined to individuals with a propensity to spread infectious disease: it can potentially be used to describe events, policies or settings. This article explores the use of the term and considers circumstances in which the wide definition can be problematic. One problem is that it can lead to undeserved apportionment of moral blame to alleged super-spreaders. Another is that it can detract from scientific investigation of the heterogeneity of COVID-19 transmission. The author calls for a clearer epidemiological definition. (shrink)

Many experts have warned that environmental degradation is increasing the likelihood of future pandemics like COVID-19, as habitat loss and poaching increase close contact between wildlife and people. This fact has been framed as a reason to increase wildlife conservation efforts. We have many good reasons to step up conservation efforts, but arguments for doing so on the basis of pandemic prevention are rhetorically, ethically, and empricially flawed.

After the Covid-19 vaccination started, social media users created an enormous amount of content on the vaccines. Especially in the early stages of vaccination, people searched and watched YouTube videos sharing personal experiences after getting the vaccines (i.e., vaccine review videos), usually titled “I got the COVID-19 vaccine.” Few studies have examined the characteristics and impacts of vaccine review videos on viewers’ responses (e.g., likes, dislikes, comments). This study investigates the content of, and reactions to, the most-viewed (...) class='Hi'>Covid-19 vaccine review videos on YouTube, based on the social communication framework. A quantitative content analysis of 148 vaccine review videos revealed their unique characteristics, including source expertise, message valence, narration, and topics. Most of the videos had a positive tone, with some urging vaccination and showing pro-vaccine attitudes. Furthermore, source expertise and hybrid message types (messages conveyed in narrative and informative ways) were not significantly related to positive responses. Rather, non-expert videos received more positive responses. The findings concern the public opinions surrounding new vaccines, including related concerns and attitudes. Given the positive tone of the content, vaccine review content made by diverse groups can be encouraged by public health institutions regardless of the creators’ expertise. (shrink)

Resumen: La rápida proliferación de la pandemia del Covid-19 por todo el mundo, trajo consigo una suerte de despertar respecto de las producciones teóricas y/o científicas en el terreno de las Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades. Según el Coronavirus Resource Center de la John Hopkins University al día 04 de mayo se registran un total de 6.570.362 de casos confirmados de contagio y pérdidas humanas a nivel mundial de un total de 387.634. Ahora bien, desde temprana data en el contexto (...) pandémico emergieron una amplia gama de documentos desde los diferentes saberes y/o disciplinas, en muchos casos llegaban a ser incluso contradictorios entre sí. En este sentido, uno de los análisis que generó una gran ola de críticas y comentarios fue el libro “¡Pandemia!: El covid-19 sacude al mundo”. En el presente artículo nos introduciremos en el libro del filósofo esloveno Slavoj Žižek para extrapolar sus reflexiones, correspondientes a un prisma psicoanalítico-filosófico al contexto latinoamericano. Palabras Clave: Covid-19; Latinoamérica; Pandemia; Slavoj Žižek.: The rapid proliferation of the Covid-19 pandemic throughout the world brought with it a kind of awakening with respect to theoretical and / or scientific productions in the field of Social Sciences and Humanities. According to the Coronavirus Resource Center of John Hopkins University, as of May 4, a total of 6,570,362 confirmed cases of contagion and human loss have been registered worldwide, out of a total of 387,634. Now, from an early date in the pandemic context, a wide range of documents emerged from different knowledge and / or disciplines, in many cases even contradictory. In this sense, one of the analyzes that generated a great wave of criticism and comments was the book "Pandemic!: The covid-19 shakes the world." In this article we will introduce ourselves in the book of the Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek to extrapolate his reflections, corresponding to a psychoanalytic-philosophical prism to the Latin American context. Key Words: Covid-19; Latin America; Pandemic; Slavoj Žižek. (shrink)

As the world held its breath for news surrounding COVID-19 and hunkered down amidst stay-at-home orders, medical students across the U.S. wondered if they would be called to serve on the front lines of the pandemic. Medical school administrators faced the challenge of protecting learners while also minimizing harm to their medical education. This balancing act raised critical questions in medical education as institutions reacted to changing guidelines. COVID-19 has punctuated already contentious areas of medical education and has (...) forced institutions and organizations to take quick action. From the perspectives of a recent medical school graduate and current resident and a practicing clinician-educator, we examine the pandemic’s impact on undergraduate medical education through an ethical lens. First, we explore the value of medical education, what drives this value, and how COVID-19 may alter it. We next consider student choice and how shifts toward utilitarianism in healthcare during a pandemic may affect learning and career exploration. Then, we inquire how access to technology may impact the experience of medical students from diverse backgrounds and varied institutions during a rapid shift to socially distanced learning. We identify vulnerabilities for students at several phases of the journey: premedical, preclinical, clinical, and preparation for residency. Finally, we address the hidden curriculum of COVID-19, its potential erosion of empathy among current medical students, and possible long-term consequences for future physicians and patients. (shrink)

The Covid-19 pandemic provides a real-world context for evaluating the fairness of disability-based rationing of scarce medical resources. I discuss three situations clinicians may face: rationing based on disability itself; rationing based on inevitable disability-related comorbidities; and rationing based on preventable disability-related comorbidities. I defend three conclusions. First, in a just distribution, extraneous factors do not influence a person’s share. This rules out rationing based on disability alone, where no comorbidities decrease a person’s capacity to benefit from treatment. Second, (...) in a just distribution, undeserved luck does not influence a person’s share. This rules out rationing for biologically caused comorbidities that decrease capacity to benefit. Third, in a just distribution, social injustice does not influence a person’s share. This rules out rationing for socially caused comorbidities that decrease capacity to benefit. (shrink)

La pandemia de la COVID-19 ha recordado la importancia de prevenir y planificarse ante eventos altamente desastrosos para la salud comunitaria. Varios fenómenos emergentes suponen amenazas prospectivas para la Salud Pública. Sin embargo, el carácter mayormente futuro de problemas como la resistencia antibiótica, el impacto del cambio climático en la salud o la bioingeniería de patógenos genera dificultades de análisis. ¿Cuáles son los desafíos éticos y epistemológicos que suscitan los problemas futuros para la Salud Pública? ¿Cómo deben abordarse los (...) problemas morales de escenarios futuros, potencialmente catastróficos? En este artículo se defiende la necesidad de adoptar enfoques éticos anticipativos desde la ética de la Salud Pública. En primer lugar, se argumentará que el abordaje de estos problemas futuros requiere reflexionar sobre el futuro como problema ético y epistémico. En segundo lugar, se analizarán las características de la incipiente ética anticipatoria en los ámbitos de la ética de la tecnología y la bioética. En tercer lugar, se defenderá la aplicación de metodologías de previsión y anticipación en debates sobre la ética de la Salud Pública. Finalmente, se ofrecerán algunas reflexiones para fortalecer los análisis normativos anticipativos a fin de prevenir y atajar de antemano los efectos adversos de las futuras crisis sanitarias. (shrink)

Employers and governments are interested in the use of serological testing to allow people to return to work before there is a vaccine for SARS-CoV-2. We articulate the preconditions needed for the implementation of antibody testing, including the role of the U.S. Food & Drug Administration.

Governmental reactions to crises like the COVID-19 pandemic can be seen as ethics communication. Governments can contain the disease and thereby mitigate the detrimental public health impact; allow the virus to spread to reach herd immunity; test, track, isolate, and treat; and suppress the disease regionally. An observation of Sweden and Finland showed a difference in feasible ways to communicate the chosen policy to the citizenry. Sweden assumed the herd immunity strategy and backed it up with health utilitarian arguments. (...) This was easy to communicate to the Swedish people, who appreciated the voluntary restrictions approach and trusted their decision makers. Finland chose the contain and mitigate strategy and was towards the end of the observation period apparently hesitating between suppression and the test, track, isolate, and treat approach. Both are difficult to communicate to the general public accurately, truthfully, and acceptably. Apart from health utilitarian argumentation, something like the republican political philosophy or selective truth telling are needed. The application of republicanism to the issue, however, is problematic, and hiding the truth seems to go against the basic tenets of liberal democracy. (shrink)

The role of bioethicists amidst crises like the COVID-19 pandemic is not well defined. As professionals in the field, they should respond, but how? The observation of the early days of pandemic confinement in Finland showed that moral philosophers with limited experience in bioethics tended to apply their favorite theories to public decisions, with varying results. Medical ethicists were more likely to lend support to the public authorities by soothing or descriptive accounts of the solutions assumed. These are approaches (...) that Tuija Takala has called the firefighting and window dressing models of bioethics. Human rights lawyers drew attention to the flaws of the government’s regulative thinking. Critical bioethicists offered analyses of the arguments presented and the moral and political theories that could be used as the basis of good and acceptable decisions. (shrink)

The Covid‐19 pandemic has altered the shape of medicine, making in‐person interactions risky for both patients and health care workers. Now, before scheduling in‐person appointments or procedures, physicians are forced to reconsider if they are truly necessary. The pandemic has thus thrown into relief the difference between evidence‐based medical care and traditional aspects of care that lack a strong evidentiary component. In this essay, we demonstrate how this has played out in prenatal care, as well as in other aspects (...) of medical care, during the pandemic. The extent to which these changes will persist beyond the most emergent phases of the pandemic is not clear, though insurance reimbursement practices and patient expectations will be determining factors. One thing, however, is certain: the longer the pandemic continues, the more difficult it will be for providers and patients to return to pre‐Covid norms. (shrink)

In “Racism and Bioethics: the myth of color blindness” Braddock convincingly argues that a “color blind” approach to triage and resource allocation in the setting of the COVID-19 pandemic pe...

Many Catholics have expressed hesitancy or resistance to being vaccinated for COVID-19, with magisterial authorities and influential Catholic organizations advocating divergent views regarding the moral liceity of the vaccines, the justification of vaccination mandates, and whether such mandates should include religious exemptions. We address each of these disputed points and argue that vaccination for COVID-19 falls within the definition of being an ordinary—and thereby morally obligatory—treatment. To that end, we offer a brief overview of the Catholic moral tradition (...) regarding the development of the distinction between ordinary and extraordinary treatment, show how the Church morally evaluates vaccination as a good act, and underline the importance of positive witnessing in supporting vaccination. (shrink)

The mobility restrictions related to COVID-19 pandemic have resulted in the biggest disruption to individual mobilities in modern times. The crisis is clearly spatial in nature, and examining the geographical aspect is important in understanding the broad implications of the pandemic. The avalanche of mobile Big Data makes it possible to study the spatial effects of the crisis with spatiotemporal detail at the national and global scales. However, the current crisis also highlights serious limitations in the readiness to take (...) the advantage of mobile Big Data for social good, both within and beyond the interests of health sector. We propose two strategical pathways for the future use of mobile Big Data for societal impact assessment, addressing access to both raw mobile Big Data as well as aggregated data products. Both pathways require careful considerations of privacy issues, harmonized and transparent methodologies, and attention to the representativeness, reliability and continuity of data. The goal is to be better prepared to use mobile Big Data in future crises. (shrink)

Democratic Republic of the Congo’s fight with Ebola was just settling when WHO declared COVID‐19 to be a global pandemic on March 12, 2020. This has caused concomitant setbacks in the treatment and control of major health issues like HIV, tuberculosis, measles, and malaria in the country. This, coupled with civil unrest and risk to the safety of the health workers, is a 'perfect storm' waiting to unfold. Military contingents as peacekeepers are having the most difficult time, handling the (...) situation, in the wake of risks involved. (shrink)