Eduardo Gómez, associate professor in Lehigh’s new College of Health, has co-authored an article with Sandro Galea, professor and dean at the Boston University School of Public Health, which was published by Think Global Health on Wednesday.
The piece, 'Politics May Kill Us, Not the Coronavirus,' calls for the need of “bipartisan support for rational actions informed by the science.”
The authors write, “In a time of the coronavirus in the United States, politics is exacerbating a public health issue, making the virus much more deadly than what it should be.
Politics, in other words, can literally kill us.”
They note the coronavirus reveals both good and bad in U.S. politics, but explain division along party lines and the shared responsibility between federal, state and local responders has delayed and hampered the response to the crisis.
The authors pose a number of questions including, “What have we learned about politics and the coronavirus in the United States? When can politics help, and when can it hurt our response? And what positive lessons can we learn going forward?”
They also discuss the politics of marginalization and consequences of political division.
The full article can be found on Think Global Health’s website.
