Five Things Students and Clinicians Should Know About "Biocontainment"

• Published in: AMA journal of ethics 2020-01, Vol.22 (1), p.E22-27
• Main Author: Chapple, Helen Stanton
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Attitude; Communicable Disease Control - methods; Containment of Biohazards - ethics; Containment of Biohazards - methods; Delivery of Health Care; Democratic Republic of the Congo; Developing Countries; Disease Outbreaks - ethics; Ethics, Medical; Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; Health Resources; Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola - epidemiology; Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola - prevention & control; Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola - transmission; Humans; Knowledge; Physical Distancing; Physician-Patient Relations - ethics; Physicians; Professional Competence; Public Health - ethics; Public Health - methods; Quarantine; Social Isolation; Students; Trust
• ISSN: 2376-6980; 2376-6980
• DOI: 10.1001/amajethics.2020.22

was one way that Western, affluent, allopathic cultures tended to respond and make meaning during the 2013-2015 Ebola virus disease (EVD) pandemic. It became a pathway to restore trust in biomedicine itself, which had been shaken by unease across the globe when the EVD threat was at its height. Yet biocontaining barely qualifies as a public health measure. Successful public health efforts rely on trust, which is difficult to maintain during a pandemic. Such efforts require balancing the need to be close to patients to care well for them against the need to remain distant from a virulent pathogen. Biocontainment tries to navigate this tension and, in so doing, simultaneously frustrates and supports public trust. This article suggests 5 things clinicians and health professions students should consider about the project of biocontainment that could affect their orientation to their public health duties.