Home Philosophy „Jetzt sollen sie aber wirklich mal wieder auf uns hören“ – Selbstbilder und Zukunftsvisionen von Public-Health- Wissenschaftler:innen im Spannungsfeld von Wissenschaft und Politik während der COVID-19 Pandemie
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„Jetzt sollen sie aber wirklich mal wieder auf uns hören“ – Selbstbilder und Zukunftsvisionen von Public-Health- Wissenschaftler:innen im Spannungsfeld von Wissenschaft und Politik während der COVID-19 Pandemie

  • Nicola Kippert , Tizia Rosendorfer , Julia Piel , Anne Meuche , Marilena von Köppen and Christian Apfelbacher
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Abstract

“Now they really ought to listen to us again.” - Public Health academic’s self-images and visions for the future in relation to science and politics during the COVID-19 Pandemic. During the COVID-19 pandemic policy-makers mainly relied on the input of the medical and natural sciences in order to minimise the number of deaths and prevent a collapse of the health care system. Notably, the expertise of Public Health was largely neglected in political discourse leading to Public Health academics re-evaluating themselves as scientists. Our study explores roles, values and (political) stand-points in view of the pandemic. To this end, we conducted interviews with Public Health academics and analysed documents issued by relevant Public Health societies using Grounded Theory. Our data allowed us to construct five different types of self-images of the science-policy making relationship: the scientific study supplier, the expert facing political issues, the restrained scholar, the public informer and the changemaker. Our findings informed two further conceptions, namely segmentation and cooperation, which encompass two different visions for the future of the Public Health community and its relation to the political sector.

Abstract

“Now they really ought to listen to us again.” - Public Health academic’s self-images and visions for the future in relation to science and politics during the COVID-19 Pandemic. During the COVID-19 pandemic policy-makers mainly relied on the input of the medical and natural sciences in order to minimise the number of deaths and prevent a collapse of the health care system. Notably, the expertise of Public Health was largely neglected in political discourse leading to Public Health academics re-evaluating themselves as scientists. Our study explores roles, values and (political) stand-points in view of the pandemic. To this end, we conducted interviews with Public Health academics and analysed documents issued by relevant Public Health societies using Grounded Theory. Our data allowed us to construct five different types of self-images of the science-policy making relationship: the scientific study supplier, the expert facing political issues, the restrained scholar, the public informer and the changemaker. Our findings informed two further conceptions, namely segmentation and cooperation, which encompass two different visions for the future of the Public Health community and its relation to the political sector.

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