Whatever the reasons are, a selective application of goodwill in confronting Ebola is not likely to be in the interest of public diplomacy especially for the US. And what more, it is not in any way likely to make for a concerted global effort that is badly needed to tackle a menacing pandemic that is no respecter of persons, race or colour. It can only foster the spread of the virus and fester a culture of fear and threaten lives everywhere. According to Tara Sonenshine, a Fellow at George Washington University’s School of Media and Public Affairs, the world should not miss the opportunity of the Ebola episode for public diplomacy. “Rather than view the Ebola outbreak as a reason to worry, let’s see it as a public diplomacy challenge and opportunity,” she wrote in a recent article published in TheGlobalist. And in a more definite tone, she adds that “If we can make the argument that preventing deadly disease is in the interests of all, we have taken a big step on the road to public education about international spending.”
Already, an online petition to get the President Barrack Obama administration to cause Zmapp to be made available to Nigeria has been kick-started and it is gaining signatories rapidly. According to a post on nairaland.com, a Nigerian blogging site, the petition (https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/release-experimental-drug-zmapp-africa/9bYrqL09) is “a call for reason over medical ethics; for conscience over principles; for humanity over capitalism. It has not shown to be scientifically proven to cure Ebola, but it has given two Americans the fighting chance of survival. The doctors and nurses in Lagos, Nigeria who contacted the Ebola disease from trying to treat American-Liberian citizen Patrick Sawyer at least deserve this fighting chance too.”
This call to the US government should not however be mistaken to mean that Nigerians, nay Africans should place their destiny on a foreign country as far as the Ebola issue is concerned. Government of the affected states owe their citizens a responsibility to secure the lives of their citizens whether against diseases or aggression from other countries. Nigeria will do well to intensify the search for indigenous solutions to the virus just as government has stoutly risen to the occasion of responding to the disease since Sawyer sneaked into the shores of the country.
Afterall, who says Nigeria cannot come up with its own brand of Zmapp and rightly employ such as a tool for medical diplomacy in her characteristic big brother fashion? And wouldn’t that be fantastic news to Amina who is yet battling for survival in an isolation facility in Lagos wishing she never had to attend to a sick and dying man from Liberia?
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