Stranger Danger – How fear of migrants can worsen disease spread

Send us Fan MailWhen the so-called Spanish Influenza started spreading in 1918, people locked themselves in their homes or even into small towns and tried to ride it out. It seemed to make sense – travelers could bring the virus with them, so wouldn’t keeping them out keep the deadly germ out, too?It did not work, of course. No one could stay isolated for years on end while the virus and its descendants made its way through the population. People are still getting infected today by a distant descendant of that virus.Humans are far too interconnected to be able to think that keeping others out will protect them from disease. Yet that attitude remains. So does the stigmatization and exclusion of migrants.Dr. Alena Kamenshchikova, an assistant professor in the Care and Public Health Research Institute (CAPHRI) at Maastricht University in the Netherlands has been studying this very complicated intersection of language, migration, and disease spread – especially the spread of antimicrobial-resistant organisms, often called superbugs.She says that all stigma does is force people to try to hide it when they are sick. Or, worse, they may take antibiotics inappropriately to try to treat themselves when they cannot get the proper healthcare they need. This inappropriate use of antibiotics can drive the rise of drug-resistant bacteria.Listen as Dr. Kamenshchikova tells some startling stories about how keeping migrants of all kinds on the margins can endanger everyone around them.