Bali Sulzhan, Stewart Kearsley A, Pate Muhammad Ali
Duke Global Health Institute, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA.
BigWin Philanthropy, Washington, District of Columbia, USA.
BMJ Glob Health. 2016 Nov 9;1(3):e000111. doi: 10.1136/bmjgh-2016-000111. eCollection 2016.
The already significant impact of the Ebola epidemic on Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, was worsened by a fear of contagion that aggravated the health crisis. However, in contrast to other Ebola-affected countries, Nigeria fared significantly better due to its swift containment of the disease. The objective of our study was to describe the impact of Ebola on the Nigerian private sector. This paper introduces and defines the term as the direct and indirect economic effects of both misinformation as well as fear-induced aversion behaviour, exhibited by individuals, organisations or countries during an outbreak or an epidemic.
This study was designed as a cross-sectional mixed-methods study that used semistructured in-depth interviews and a supporting survey to capture the impact of Ebola on the Nigerian private sector after the outbreak. Themes were generated from the interviews on the direct and indirect impact of Ebola on the private sector; the impact of misinformation and fear-based aversion behaviour in the private sector.
Our findings reveal that the fearonomic effects of Ebola included health service outages and reduced healthcare usage as a result of misinformation and aversion behaviour by both patients and providers. Although certain sectors (eg, health sector, aviation sector, hospitality sector) in Nigeria were affected more than others, no business was immune to Ebola's fearonomic effects. We describe how sectors expected to prosper during the outbreak (eg, pharmaceuticals), actually suffered due to the changes in consumption patterns and demand shocks.
In a high-stressor epidemic-like setting, altered consumption behaviour due to distorted disease perception, misinformation and fear can trigger short-term economic cascades that can disproportionately affect businesses and lead to financial insecurity of the poorest and the most vulnerable in a society.
埃博拉疫情对几内亚、利比里亚和塞拉利昂已经造成了巨大影响，而对传染的恐惧加剧了健康危机，使情况更加恶化。然而，与其他受埃博拉影响的国家不同，尼日利亚由于迅速控制了疫情，情况要好得多。我们研究的目的是描述埃博拉对尼日利亚私营部门的影响。本文引入并定义了“恐惧经济学”这一术语，它指的是在疫情或流行病爆发期间，个人、组织或国家因错误信息以及恐惧引发的厌恶行为所产生的直接和间接经济影响。
本研究设计为一项横断面混合方法研究，采用半结构化深度访谈和辅助调查来了解疫情爆发后埃博拉对尼日利亚私营部门的影响。通过访谈生成了关于埃博拉对私营部门的直接和间接影响、私营部门中错误信息和基于恐惧的厌恶行为的影响等主题。
我们的研究结果表明，埃博拉的恐惧经济效应包括由于患者和医疗服务提供者的错误信息及厌恶行为导致的医疗服务中断和医疗保健使用减少。尽管尼日利亚的某些部门（如卫生部门、航空部门、酒店业）比其他部门受到的影响更大，但没有哪个企业能免受埃博拉恐惧经济效应的影响。我们描述了一些在疫情期间本应繁荣的部门（如制药业），实际上却因消费模式的变化和需求冲击而遭受损失。
在类似高压力疫情的环境中，由于对疾病的认知扭曲、错误信息和恐惧导致的消费行为改变，可能引发短期经济连锁反应，对企业产生不成比例的影响，并导致社会中最贫困和最脆弱群体的金融不安全。
