Should transparency about pandemics be enforced by law?

[GuessTheAltAccount]

Sounds hard to both enforce and qualify what accounts as "being disingenuous about a pandemic." From my point of view, a guy like Trump wasn't transparent about the COVID threat by any measure, but that would be hard to prove beyond a reasonable doubt from a legal perspective.

In an ideal world, we could "punish" our elected officials for being untransparent and for breaching the trust of the public. But in this imperfect world, we have an imperfect yet workable solution for those who want it. It's called the ballot box.

I'm all for ranked ballots so that scum like Trump are less reliant on the flaws of alternatives like Clinton and Biden in the path to power.

But would we apply this exact same standard if he were to actually follow through on his "5th avenue" threat?

[Nanatsu no Tsuki]

All I will say is that in the face of a health emergency, transparency is of the utmost importance.

[Gim]

All I will say is that in the face of a health emergency, transparency is of the utmost importance.

Considering that China's trying to hide their cases to look as if they are securely blocking out the pandemic.

[Nanatsu no Tsuki]

All I will say is that in the face of a health emergency, transparency is of the utmost importance.

Considering that China's trying to hide their cases to look as if they are securely blocking out the pandemic.

Eh, but we all know China’s that full of shit. My beef is with how the past administration downplayed and obfuscated the truth about the seriousness of the pandemic to the point we’re still dealing with the consequences. Misinformation in the US is huge, backpedaling of health authorities caused a lot of doubt and now… well, now all you have to do is watch the news or read online to see how hot spots of infection are breaking because entire communities refuse to vaccinate. The US will be dealing with bouts of SARS-CoV-2 for who knows how long.

The government wasn’t transparent.

[Grazilina]

I believe transparency of pandemics would create more awareness and prevention of the outbreak. Although at first it might cause panic, people will understand the severity of the situation and make changes to protect themselves and others. For example, the pandemic has turned into a political battlefield, over something that effects everyone in society no matter their political beliefs. With transparency being a law, more politicians will be exposed of their carelessness over something as serious as a pandemic, if they fail to comply. Therefore, more of society will be able to agree on general wellness of the world and less about whether their political freedoms matter in a dire situation like a pandemic.

[The Outlaw Queen]

As far as the original question is concerned, more transparency would have been valuable in hindsight. Look at the issues we are facing now because of this. Everyone seems to be pairing off into drastic opinion groups and pointing fingers. We have the most technology for any generation so far, with the ability to pass information along quickly. Trusted sources being open and upfront with the development and spreading of a pandemic would have created a slight panic, sure. However, didn't a panic happen anyway? I mean have we forgotten 6 months of no toilet paper or boxes of pasta on the shelves?