A new working paper published by the Social, Technological and Environmental Pathways to Sustainability (STEPS) Centre, located at the University of Sussex in the United Kingdom, examines the “political economy of knowledge in responses to the 2009-10 influenza pandemic.” The lead author, Dr. Paul Forster, argues that, “Universalistic, one-size fits all responses drawn from reductive science are therefore argued to be insufficient, and possibly misguided. Planning and response efforts must consider diverse local settings and concerns.”

The working paper entitled To Pandemic or Not? Reconfiguring Global Responses to Influenza was published in late January. It is built on years of research conducted by both the University of Sussex Centre for Global Health Policy (CGHP) and STEPS.

Professor Stefan Elbe, director of CGHP, said “One of the main lessons learned was that preparing for flu is simply not just about flu; it is just as much—if not more so—about the interventions that we need to implement in orders to manage a pandemic.” He continued, “North-South politics and global-local politics loom large, as responses geared to international health and economic interests often conflict with priorities of people in local settings.” He went on to argue that “As the world prepares for the inevitable next pandemic, new ways of working and new organizational mechanisms for assuring global health—combining natural and social sciences approaches—are needed.”