The one upside of a genuine crisis, the one silver lining that we all cling to in a sea of despair, is that somehow, however dark things have become, we might at least find some way to learn from it in the future.
Which is why, during the COVID-19 pandemic, in addition to writing a book of essays1, I thought it would be fitting to make a film2 and podcast series3 about many thoughtful people’s reflections on it in real time (Pandemic Perspectives), because there’s nothing like a global emergency to pare away the usual vacuous tropes we’re constantly bombarded with and simply focus the mind on genuinely pressing societal priorities and how to best address them.
And the one topic that consistently came to the fore during my many (remotely filmed) discussions, unsurprisingly, was health care: how a pivotal aspect of a just and well-functioning society is its ability to provide effective and dignified medical treatment for all of its citizens; and, correspondingly, the hugely important role that is consistently played by the vast range of people involved in the system: from nurses to doctors to pharmacists to volunteers to university researchers to ambulance drivers and many, many more besides.
Remember how we all made a point of banging our pots and pans each evening in appreciation of their efforts? Remember how we called them “heroes”? Remember how it was suddenly overwhelmingly obvious that we must drastically increase funding for our vital medical infrastructure?
Well, unbelievably, only a few years later, it seems like nobody does.
I live in France, a country whose magnificent, yet steadily eroding, health care system is by far the best I’ve ever seen. And the other night, driven by my tediously unshakeable, old-fashioned belief that every member of a society has an obligation to be reasonably informed of issues of the day, I reluctantly put down my book on Botticelli and tuned in to the televised debate that was held shortly before the first round of France’s legislative elections.
So what did I see? Well, aside from the standard political posturing—performed, in typically French fashion, with everyone speaking at once so that no information (very broadly defined) could conceivably be transmitted—and the unmistakably sulfurous whiff of xenophobic scapegoating that so sadly seems a feature of political life in so many places these days, I was struck by the fact that nothing of the unprecedented upheaval we’ve all recently been through left the slightest imprint on the proceedings.
There was not one mention of how our increasingly overburdened medical system must be substantially enhanced (other than a brief nonsensical “discussion” on whether or not we should force doctors to go to under-serviced areas); there was not one word on how the nation’s research culture—biological or otherwise—should be improved, there was not the slightest acknowledgement of the well-documented correlation between environmental degradation and the deeply alarming health consequences that quickly ripple around the planet.
Instead, among the torrent of inanity I was deluged with (like sententious pronouncements on how to curb current levels of inflation without the slightest reference to the Russian invasion of Ukraine that was its principal cause), the comment that stood out the most for me came from the intellectually benighted android Jordan Bardella, who bombastically informed us that, “there is not one French person watching tonight who doesn’t fear for his or her security in public.”
Of course this is pathetic fear-mongering, and of course it is laughably wrong, but what I find particularly striking, and not a little ironic, is that it is only laughably wrong now. Three years ago, when a global pandemic was raging and we were all forced to dress up for surgery and sign an official declaration before heading out for our one permitted hour to walk our dogs, it was actually true. The coronavirus pandemic wasn’t just unpleasant. It was often terrifying.
Am I the only one who actually remembers that?
Howard Burton, July 3, 2024
Howard is the Director of Pandemic Perspectives (2022), Through the Mirror of Chess: A Cultural Exploration (2023), Raphael: A Portrait (2024) and Botticelli’s Primavera (2025) which is the first film in our Renaissance Masterpieces Series.
- Pandemic Perspectives: A filmmaker’s journey in 10 essays ↩︎
- Pandemic Perspectives “The SARS-COV-2 pandemic stopped the world. This film tells us how we might restart it, and perhaps do better next time around. The interviews make the viewer think long and hard about how we got ourselves into this mess, what we can learn from it, and what it says about us as a species.” — Lorraine Daston, Director Emerita Max Planck Institute for the History of Science ↩︎
- We hosted podcast conversations with 24 of the 32 international experts in biology, education, history, law, philosophy, politics, psychology and more who participated in the film. More details about Ideas Roadshow podcast channel HERE. ↩︎
