- Published
- 27 September 2022
- Journal article
Human preparedness: Relational infrastructures and medical countermeasures in Sierra Leone
- Authors
- Source
- Global Public Health
Abstract
This paper examines health worker experiences in two areas of post-epidemic preparedness in Sierra Leone–vaccine trials and laboratory strengthening–to reflect on the place of people in current models of epidemic response. Drawing on ethnographic research and interviews with health workers in the aftermath of Ebola, it explores the hopes and expectations that interventions foster for frontline workers in under-resourced health systems, and describes the unseen work involved in sustaining robust response infrastructures. Our analysis focuses on what it means for the people who sustain health systems in an emergency to be ‘prepared’ for an epidemic. Human preparedness entails more than the presence of a labour force; it involves building and maintaining ‘relational infrastructures’, often fragile social and moral relationships between health workers, publics, governments, and international organisations. The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored the value of rethinking human resources from an anthropological perspective, and investing in the safety and support of people at the forefront of response. In describing the labour, personal losses, and social risks undertaken by frontline workers for protocols and practicality to meet in an emergency context, we describe the social process of preparedness; that is, the contextual engineering and investment that make response systems work.
Rights
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
Cite as
Lee, S., Vernooij, E., Enria, L., Kelly, A., Rogers, J., Ansumana, R., Bangura, M., Lees, S. & Street, A. 2022, 'Human preparedness: Relational infrastructures and medical countermeasures in Sierra Leone', Global Public Health, 17(12), pp. 4129-4145. https://doi.org/10.1080/17441692.2022.2110917