When the next pandemic hits, will we be ready?
That’s the question at the center of University of Minnesota epidemiologist Mike Osterholm’s new book, “The Big One.” And his answer is sobering.
Osterholm joined Kerri Miller on this week’s Big Books and Bold Ideas for a blunt and personal assessment of what went right and what went wrong during the COVID-19 pandemic. He’s insistent that if we don’t learn the lessons of the last pandemic, we will be even less prepared for the next one.
Here are five key takeaways from their conversation.
1. Public health communication can’t just be factual.
Osterholm is the founding director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota and has decades of experience tracking and researching outbreaks. He said the big lesson for public health leaders is that kindness and humility have to be forefront as they communicate.
Humility is important, he told Miller, because “people mistakenly think that science is truth. It’s not. Science is the pursuit of truth.” He said the scientific community needs to do a better job explaining what we know now and how that might change as research continues.
But the bigger lesson, for him, was that a “just the facts, ma’am” approach isn’t effective. Public health messages need to resonate with people on a personal level.
Early in the pandemic, he broke down crying on his own podcast after a close colleague’s death. That human moment ended up being a connection point for people.
“It wasn’t about the factual stuff I talked about,” Osterholm said. “It was about relating to people on that emotional level of what we were experiencing and how we reach out to each other. So the podcast became more and more of a blending of the science — what’s in the head — with concern for what’s in the heart.”
2. When we know what stops transmission, go all-in on that.
3. Mandates aren’t a magic solution.
4. The lack of a nonpartisan reports to examine the errors made during COVID-19 is glaring.
5. We are going backward on preparedness for the next pandemic.
