Waiting For the Disaster To Come
A comparative pandemic flu planning analysis

Didier Torny

 

Since 1997 and the Hong Kong bird flu episode, WHO has been mobilizing its member-states for the next major disaster, an influenza pandemic of avian origin. This need for preparation is obviously seen in the massive adoption of plans outlining measures to be taken and actors to be accounted for in the event of a pandemic. After focusing on the modalities of this mobilization, my communication based on the comparative analysis of a dozen national plans will emphasize the importance of competitive framings provided by international institutions (FAO, OIE, WHO) and the diversity of “preparedness” expected by public authorities.

 

 

Bibliography

ingram_geopolitics.pdf — Alan Ingram, The New Geopolitics of Disease: Between Global Health and Global Security, Geopolitics, Volume 10, Number 3, Autumn 2005 , pp. 522-545.

bhattacharya_fallacies.pdf — Dhrubajyoti Bhattacharya, An Exploration of Conceptual and Temporal Fallacies in International Health Law and Promotion of Global Public Health Preparedness, The Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, Volume 35, Issue 4, December 2007, pp. 588-598.

jacobs_SARS_crisis.pdf — Lesley A. Jacobs, Rights and Quarantine During the SARS Global Health Crisis: Differentiated Legal Consciousness in Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Toronto, Law & Society Review, Volume 41, Number 3, 2007, pp. 511-552.

nerlich_halliday_avian_flu.pdf — Brigitte Nerlich and Christopher Halliday, Avian flu: the creation of expectations in the interplay between science and the media, Sociology of Health & Illness, Vol. 29 No. 1 pp. 46–65, 2007.

quah_trust.pdf — Stella R. Quah, The Significance of Trust in Public Health Governance, in Stella R. Quah (ed.)., Crisis Preparedness: Asia and the Global Governance of Epidemics, Stanford University, 2007. Source of the text here reproduced in PDF format:

http://www.cpu.gov.hk/english/documents/conference/20071123_hk_seminar_2007_paper_stella.pdf

WHO global influenza preparedness plan, 2005:

http://www.who.int/entity/csr/resources/publications/influenza/GIP_2005_5Eweb.pdf

 

 

Didier Torny’s webpage
from where his publications can be accessed

http://www.ivry.inra.fr/tsv/cv-chercheurs/didier-torny.html

Personal publications related to this presentation

(most of these publications can be downloaded from Torny's webpage)

F. Chateauraynaud; D. Torny, Les sombres précurseurs. Une Sociologie pragmatique de l’alerte et du risque, Editions de l'EHESS, Paris, 1999, 476 p.

F. Chateauraynaud; D. Torny, Mobiliser autour d’un risque. Des lanceurs aux porteurs d’alerte, in Risques et crises alimentaires, Cécile Lahellec (ed.), Lavoisier, 2005, pp. 329-339.

D. Torny, L’administration des risques sanitaires face à l'éloignement de l'expertise: le cas français au tournant des années 2000, Sociologies et société, Vol. XXXIX, n°1, printemps 2007, pp. 181-196.

D. Torny, L’administration sanitaire entre contraintes techniques et contraintes juridiques: l’exemple des maladies émergentes, Revue générale de droit médical, septembre 2005, pp. 75-83.

D. Torny, “Mais pourquoi résistent-ils?” Conditions de réalisation d'actions de santé publique sur une base épidémiologique, in L'Epidémiologie Humaine. Conditions de son développement en France, et rôle des mathématiques, J. Valleron (dir.), EDP Sciences, Paris, 2006, pp. 265-271.