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Running head: Contagion Movie Assessment Contagion Movie Assessment Katelyn Strasser Concordia University Nebraska 1 Contagion Movie Assessment 2 The movie Contagion illustrates the world’s reaction to a deadly respiratory disease outbreak. Many circumstances and details of the movie make the scenario very realistic and plausible. The movie depicts many real public health agencies working together to stop the outbreak and find a cure. An epidemiologist from the World Health Organization (WHO) travels to Hong Kong to find the source of the infection, and the Centers for Disease Control sends an Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) officer to Minnesota to track the disease there (Skoll, 2011). The EIS is a real 2-year post-graduate training epidemiology program for health professionals and scientists. The officers are sent into the field when disease outbreaks occur in the United States (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2013). It is certainly believable to think that if a disease this deadly appeared, the CDC would be sent to investigate. In the movie, the CDC also partners with the Minnesota Department of Health. Together, the groups track cases, set up an area to quarantine the sick, and bring in FEMA to supply food and water (Skoll, 2011). The movie uses these various public health organizations to show how epidemiological data is gathered. The epidemiologist from the WHO is sent to Hong Kong to find the original source of the infection. She uses a variety of methods to collect data including looking into the personal lives of the deceased and visiting their former homes, and interviewing those individuals who are currently ill. She asks questions about where they have been, whom they have been with, and what kind of environmental sources they may have been exposed to. She even watches video surveillance to find the index person and follow the path of transmission. The EIS officer in Minnesota goes through a similar process of collecting data. She uses it to attempt to predict future infection rates (Skoll, 2011). Oftentimes, the work of public health officials is met with resistance, and this movie demonstrated it by showing the difficult circumstances that the epidemiologists had to face. In Contagion Movie Assessment 3 Hong Kong, the Chinese officials continually question the epidemiologist’s work and assertions. It’s not until the video footage supports her claims that they know the outbreak started there. The Chinese government probably acts this way because they would not want the start of an epidemic associated with their country. The EIS officer also confronts opposition from the Minnesota Health Department. They seem skeptical of the epidemiologist’s methods. They are less convinced that the epidemiological data the officer is collecting is the way to combat this outbreak. Interestingly, the movie sensationalizes these characters a little by having the WHO member kidnapped as a ransom for the vaccine, and by having the EIS officer contract the disease and die (Skoll, 2011). The death of the EIS officer showed the seriousness and potential impact of an infectious disease outbreak. Many other facts about contagious diseases were included in this movie. The movie mentioned that the containment protocol that included quarantining and screening for symptoms was the same protocol as was conducted during the SARS outbreak in 2003. The movie also discussed how this disease could be spread through the air in respiratory droplets or through fomites, which is contact transmission. This is how many other infections like the common cold, strep, and meningitis are spread. From a medical perspective, the movie was accurate in depicting the symptoms of such a disease. It showed infected individuals developing a fever, sore throat, and cough. Other symptoms indicating encephalitis include a headache and seizures, both commonly experienced by the infected in the movie. The movie also explained how difficult it would be to develop a vaccine for a contagious disease like this because the virus is able to mutate, and it’s difficult to culture due to its lethal effect on cells (Skoll, 2011). Past outbreaks such as SARS and H1N1 confirm that an outbreak such as the one in Contagion is a real possibility. A pandemic of this magnitude would likely shut down public Contagion Movie Assessment 4 transportation, enlist the help of military services, and potentially cause episodes of violence, such as the looting seen in the movie. Individuals, like the reporter in the movie, may also try to use the situation to commit fraud for financial benefit. It is a little frightening to think that statistically, an influenza pandemic occurs three times a century. When the last outbreak of H1N1 occurred in 2009, scientists were unsure if this would be the next great pandemic (CDC Foundation, 2013). Due to this uncertainty, the CDC is always prepared for the next great pandemic or other small outbreaks. The CDC’s Emergency Operations Center monitors and organizes emergency response systems to public health threats domestically and internationally. If an outbreak like the one in the movie were to occur, the CDC would work with city and state health departments. The CDC could potentially assume many roles such as conducting surveillance, lab testing and analysis, collecting epidemiological data, and managing the care of infected patients. As in the movie, the CDC’s utmost objective would be to “determine the cause of the illness, the source of the infection/virus/toxin, learn how it is transmitted and how readily it is spread, how to break the cycle of transmission and prevent further cases and how patients can best be treated” (CDC, 2013). The CDC would also send medical teams to give treatment to patients and CDC scientists would work to engineer a vaccine and make it available to the public (CDC, 2013). As the movie Contagion illustrates, there is a great deal of uncertainty and a potential for calamity during pandemics. However, it is comforting knowing the agencies like the CDC have protocols and programs in place to help during these events. 5 Contagion Movie Assessment References CDC Foundation. (2013). How CDC saves lives by controlling real global disease outbreaks. Retrieved from http://www.cdcfoundation.org/content/howcdc-saves-lives-controlling-real-global-disease-outbreaks Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2013). Epidemic intelligence service (EIS). Retrieved from http://www.cdc.gov/EIS/ Skoll, J., Polaire, M., King, Jonathan., & Soderbergh, S. (2011). Contagion. United States of America: Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.