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Participants discuss a map illustrated on butcher paper rather than the pre-supplied GIS map and key. Photo by author.
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Global anxieties about avian influenza stem from a growing recognition that highly-virulent, highly-mobile disease vectors infiltrate human spaces in ways that are difficult to perceive, and even more difficult to manage. This article analyses a participatory health intervention in Việt Nam to explore how avian influenza threats challenge long-held...
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Monitoring and early detection of emerging infectious diseases in wild animals is of crucial global importance, yet reliable ways to measure immune status and responses are lacking for animals in the wild. Here we assess the usefulness of bio-loggers for detecting disease outbreaks in free-living birds and confirm detailed responses using leukocyte...
Citations
... On the contrary, countries like Cambodia provide no support for affected Farmers (Alders et al. 2014). In recent past due to the influenza pandemics domestic poultry faced many crises, and the most affected element of the industry was lower-scale poor farmers (Porter 2012). In developing countries like Vietnam, total losses to the poultry industry, especially to small-scale farmers, were over a hundred Dollars. ...
Avian influenza viruses (AIVs) pose a significant threat to both poultry and human populations due to their ability to cross species barriers. This review explores the genetic diversity and factors influencing the pathogenicity of Influenza A viruses, focusing on the H5N2 subtypes currently circulating in China. The viral subtypes are determined by Neuraminidase (NA) and Hemagglutinin (HA) genes, with H5N2 variants dominating recent outbreaks. The presence of polybasic cleavage sites in the HA molecule is a key indicator of high pathogenicity. Notably, the NP, PB1, and PB2 proteins contribute to increased pathogenicity. Outbreaks are classified based on cytotoxicity and the presence of polybasic cleavage sites in the HA. The dissemination of AIVs is closely linked to wild birds, especially migratory species. HPAI spread through migratory flyways, raising concerns about cross-continental transmission. The study addresses the role of migratory birds, exploring questions regarding their ability to carry infections while migrating and the involvement of illegal exotic bird trade in viral spread. Surveillance measures are crucial for early detection and preparation, necessitating updated kits and knowledge about wild bird behavior. The global impact of AIVs on the poultry industry is profound, affecting both small and large-scale farmers. Economic losses, culling practices, and societal impacts are discussed, emphasizing the vulnerability of small-scale farmers in developing countries. Prevention strategies involve understanding migratory patterns, implementing effective surveillance, and preparing management protocols. Coordination among organizations and heightened situational awareness are vital components of proactive measures against AIV outbreaks.
... Different understandings of places at risk influence what is perceived as appropriate disease management and targets for disease eradication measures. Porter (2012) illustrates how different understandings of places and relations associated with the risk of transmission of avian influenza differed between farmers and health workers. She finds that farmers attributed the fostering of disease to non-human actors' relationship with poultry, such as cold winds, flying feathers, and drifting viruses. ...
... This chapter pays attention to how this framework was taken up by PREDICT agents, whose sampling practices, as we saw in Chapter 2, foreground the bat in different ways from scientific disciplines, and how this framework was contested by the people to whom responsibility for human-animal transmission is deflected. I reflect here on the biopolitical fallouts of the idea of Ebola's origin in a dialogue with three related anthropological concepts: 'risky zoographies' (Porter 2012), the 'hotspot' (Brown & Kelly 2014) and 'zoonotic semiotics' (Sodikoff 2019). The three concepts presuppose that messy human-animal-nonhuman entanglements, shaped across multiple spatial and temporal scales, drive the movement of pathogens (see also Nading 2013). ...
This dissertation examines the ways in which the ‘truth’ about an outbreak of zoonotic disease stabilises through the labour of sampling animals. While scarcely any case of Ebola had ever been reported in West Africa, the deadliest epidemic to date started in 2013 in the southeastern region of Guinea called ‘Forest Guinea’. Since then, ecologists and virologists from Africa, America and Europe have been conducting the largest investigation into what some frame as the origins of Ebola: they are trying to establish a fuller picture of the processes by which the disease is maintained and infects humans in a place that has become known as one of its ‘hotspots’. During 16 months of ethnographic fieldwork, I closely tracked the Guinean staff of one of those foreign projects – local vets who professionally defined their role as préleveurs (‘samplers’ in English) – while they captured animals, took, and dispatched fluid samples, communicated about the risks of contact with bats, and disclosed the finding of a new species of Ebola virus in bat species. The social sciences have dismantled the idea of singular, hegemonic epidemic origins, and indicated that complex sociospatial conditions allow for epidemics to emerge. This dissertation adopts a different analytical angle and outlines the technological, epistemological, and affective consequences of framing microbiological research as a search for the origin of epidemics. It focuses on the economy of knowledge, epistemological labour, and ethical aspirations of animal préleveurs, whose work is to make a hotspot exist in Forest Guinea. By combining attention to history, the scientific literature and ethnographic fieldwork, I resituate animal sampling within a West African genealogy of asymmetrical extraction and conservation, which crosscuts the colonial sciences, interwar disease ecology, global health, outbreak preparedness, and the newer One Health agenda. At the core of this multifaceted sampling enterprise is an interdependence between anticipatory practices and forms of insecurity – political, economic, environmental. The thesis suggests that insecurity is normalised by hotspot investigations, and that associated social hierarchies, causalities and moralities inflect the local notion of responsibility for the epidemic. Ultimately, insecurity configures the production of evidence about the so-called reservoir of Ebola and leads the hypothesis of a bat origin to gain strength in Guinea. The dissertation chapters foreground the controversies, dissimulation practices, fear, and cynicism that the quest for epidemic origins elicits locally, even as it contributes to imposing a single narrative for disease causality. In so doing, I challenge a social science view that scientific claims become authoritative when the institutions and practices that manufacture them are socially recognised as trustworthy and legitimate, i.e., secure. Instead, insecurity is entangled in the material performances and ethos of préleveurs. Far from only producing scientific evidence for experts, their activity generates clues about Ebola’s origins for many people in Guinea and Africa more generally – with significant consequences for research priorities and prevention policies.
... Anthropological studies focused on variety of biosecurity have compared corporate, state and systems security with farm biosecurity in Indonesia (3) and how global-state-society relations affect bird flu management in Vietnam (4). Porter also showed how risk perception may vary significantly within a local population in Vietnam, and how divergent risk maps, made by poultry farmers and health workers, represent the wider difficulties in how to define and manage avian influenza risks (5). An anthropological study of the reorganization of health system and health management in Hong Kong after the first outbreaks in 1997 emphasised both difference and omission, as this was being done without using notions such as ' Asian culture' and ' Asian ecology', ignoring the conditions and context behind bird diseases, showing the gaps between a scientifically and institutionally portrayed reality and a lived reality (6). ...
... Each trading pattern consists of several variations, depending on the number of traders and market vendors involved in a given bird transaction. Such a trading scenario has implications 5 A typical live bird shop is about 10 m 2 . The number of poultry shops within a market ranges between 2 and 45 at the 55 identified live bird markets in Chattogram City, a market defined as an open space where at least two peoples sell poultry at least once a week as their main activity. ...
In this paper, we identify behaviours in live bird commodity chains in Chattogram, Bangladesh, which may influence the risk of pathogen emergence and transmission: the nature of poultry trade, value appropriation and selling sick or infected birds. Examining the reasons why actors engage in these behaviours, we emphasise the politics of constraints within a context of real-world decisions, governed by existential and pragmatic agency. Focusing on contact zones and entanglement, analysing patron-client relationships and precarious circumstances, we argue that agency and structure specific to the Bangladeshi context produce a risk environment. Structural constraints may reinforce risky occupational practises and limit individual agency. Structural constraints need to be addressed in order to tackle animal and zoonotic disease risk along live animal commodity chains.
... Enfin, parce que ces maladies ne connaissent pas de frontière, elles contribuent à légitimer et à renforcer le rôle des organisations internationales (OI) qui en sont d'importants promoteurs [voir, par exemple, FAO et al. (2008)]. Les travaux de sciences sociales portant sur le concept OH interrogent les frontières et les relations entre humains et non-humains (Keck, 2012 ;Porter, 2012), mais aussi sa capacité de mobilisation (Michalon, 2019), les frontières entre les domaines de l'action publique et les concurrences juridictionnelles que sa mise en oeuvre contribue à réorganiser (Jerolmack, 2013 ;Gardon et al., 2019) en particulier au niveau international (Chien, 2013 ;Figuié, 2014). ...
L’article examine l’histoire, les définitions, les objectifs assignés aux politiques de santé animale. Ces politiques associent des objectifs nombreux et potentiellement contradictoires de santé publique, d’économie agricole, de commerce international, de bien-être animal, et plus récemment, d’en faire une composante du triptyque One Health. Ce dernier objectif est lié à la mobilisation de la communauté internationale (FAO, OMS et OIE [Organisation mondiale de la santé animale]) pour la santé globale. La santé animale devient simultanément un enjeu de biosécurité et un bien public mondial. Ce recadrage permet de mobiliser la communauté internationale sur le registre de la menace et de l’intérêt général. L’exemple de la grippe aviaire au Vietnam montre la nécessité de veiller à ce que ce recadrage ne marginalise pas les enjeux et les apprentissages locaux. Plus généralement, la santé animale est un objet politique qu’il faut dénaturaliser. Les sciences sociales permettent de comprendre les intérêts, les valeurs en concurrence dans le concept de santé animale et de nourrir le débat sur ce que nous voulons en faire pour construire un monde plus sûr mais aussi plus solidaire entre États ainsi qu’entre humains et animaux.
... As supported by Høg et al. (2019) and Porter (2012) and Wong and Sam (2011) it is important to continue biosecurity research specific to context, culture, and disease of different ethnic and socioeconomic groups; HPAI can impact social as well as economic livelihoods. Mankad (2016) has also supported this view reflecting on local culture and social norms, pointing out that farmers may be more likely to adopt biosecurity strategies if there is a perception that others are doing the same. ...
Background
In Southeast Asia from 2004 to 2006, highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) resulted in culling 45 million birds and jeopardizing sustainable agricultural production. HPAI is highly virulent; small‐scale farms present a high‐risk environment for disease transmission between animals and humans. We investigated how attitudes toward HPAI influence water‐related biosecurity mitigation behaviors on small‐scale farms in Vietnam using the conceptual framework Social Cognitive Theory.
Method
We analyzed a secondary cross‐sectional data set from northern (Thai Binh) and southern (An Giang) provinces in Vietnam, describing a stratified randomized selection of 600 small‐scale farmers who were interviewed using questionnaires and in‐person interviews. Logistic regression analysis and odds ratios were used to examine relationships between factors influencing HPAI attitudes, social norms, perceived importance, and behaviors (α = 0.10)
Results
Concern about the severity of HPAI was significantly associated with increased perceived importance for all water management biosecurity methods (p < 0.01). Media and/or peer influence had negative effects on perceived importance to practice water‐related biosecurity (p < 0.10). High importance of practice water‐related biosecurity resulted in high uptake (p < 0.05). Past experiences with HPAI were significant in predicting perceived importance; none were significant in describing behavior uptake.
Discussion
Biosecurity guidelines may not be consistent with management styles of Vietnamese small‐scale farms; perceived importance of a behavior may be an important mediating variable. Gaps exist in uptake of water management practices as biosecurity for HPAI, potentially negatively affected by peer and media influence. Our results should be of interest to public health and policy authorities addressing HPAI mitigation.
... We have shown evidence that communicating the health and disease prevention messages is dependent on using the appropriate means, and pictorial representations outperformed literal presentations in health information communication to generate the intended outcomes. Porter (Porter 2012, Porter 2013) has earlier highlighted the importance of using ethnographic details and images to communicate avian influenza information. ...
Outbreaks of avian influenza H5N1 in poultry occurred in Africa’s poultry and 16 countries have reported human infections globally. Intensified human-animal interactions necessitate correct communication of health messages to reduce zoonotic infection. This work was done to determine differences between pictorial and literal health education communication. Cross-sectional survey using literal and pictorial questionnaires in LBMs and poultry farms was carried out among respondents based on matching criteria. Responses were scored and analysed with probability of independence using Chi square test and pairwise correlation. The degree of knowledge of clinical signs in birds, species affected, communication means and biosecurity were good, that of the post-mortem signs was poor with increasing potentials of human exposure to virus-rich visceral tissues from slaughtered sick birds. Marked differences exist for the various items listed within each knowledge field, the odds of having correct responses from pictorial were better than with literal respondents. Risky practices were still practised in the LBMs despite the good degree of knowledge of hygiene and biosecurity. Knowledge and implementation does not always correlate and pictorial representation out surpasses literal method in communicating potential zoonotic H5N1 influenza A infection to the undiscerning public.
... Our attention to lived experience and everyday practices adds an empirical human perspective on risk and biosecurity, as opposed to multispecies ethnographies of avian influenza that have focussed on 'narratives' (Lowe 2010) and 'risk mapping' (Porter 2012a). Social science studies recognize a plurality of 'biosecurity'. ...
... It embraces social life, context and process, in which biosecurity and risk management depends on human organization. Indeed, anthropologists have shown the difficulties in defining and managing avian flu risk: the uncertainty among scientists and regulators in the US, the UK and Vietnam (Porter 2016), in managing bio-risks in France, Germany and the UK (Lentzos and Rose 2009), competing descriptions of animals and their habitats in zoonotic disease contexts in Vietnam (Porter 2012a) and the uncertainty about the nature and consequences of avian influenza in Indonesia (Lowe 2010). By focussing on risk and biosecurity along the live bird commodity chain between independent production sites, market maker scenes and outlets, we emphasize the divergent and competing risk rationalities drawing attention to the unpredictable nature of avian influenza. ...
This paper anthropologically explores how key actors in the Chittagong live bird trading network perceive biosecurity and risk in relation to avian influenza between production sites, market maker scenes and outlets. They pay attention to the past and the present, rather than the future, downplaying the need for strict risk management, as outbreaks have not been reported frequently for a number of years. This is analysed as ‘temporalities of risk perception regarding biosecurity’, through Black Swan theory, the idea that unexpected events with major effects are often inappropriately rationalized (Taleb in The Black Swan. The impact of the highly improbable, Random House, New York, 2007). This incorporates a sociocultural perspective on risk, emphasizing the contexts in which risk is understood, lived, embodied and experienced. Their risk calculation is explained in terms of social consent, practical intelligibility and convergence of constraints and motivation. The pragmatic and practical orientation towards risk stands in contrast to how risk is calculated in the avian influenza preparedness paradigm. It is argued that disease risk on the ground has become a normalized part of everyday business, as implied in Black Swan theory. Risk which is calculated retrospectively is unlikely to encourage investment in biosecurity and, thereby, points to the danger of unpredictable outlier events.
... New feed and pharmaceutical inputs are engendering faster-growing, higher yield poultry varieties, while simultaneously exposing flocks to novel health risks such as antimicrobial resistance (Allen and Lavau 2014). Biosafety and security measures, in turn, struggle to keep up with the health risks that accompany scaled-up commodity chains (Porter 2012;Keck 2014;Hinchliffe et al. 2008). ...
... Rural dwellers find themselves in the midst of these trends, moving in (and out) of cities to engage in an array of livelihood activities -and in many cases they are motivated by a perception that the countryside is stagnant, miserable, and without a future (Harms 2011;Harms 2016;Hoang 2015). Such rural devaluations are compounded by emerging and re-emerging livestock diseases, which have destabilised markets for rural goods and further compromised the long-term viability of agricultural economies (Porter 2012). ...
... For example, agro-industralization and global health risks have revealed major problems with industrial farming and the relativity of the boundary between species (Milton, 2009;Porter, 2012). Animal diseases and food crises present an opportunity to study the micro processes of the government of life, as well as the role of science in biosocial organization (Enticott, 2001;Manceron, 2009;Manceron and Roué, 2009;Milton, 2009). ...
