‘Uncertainty’ Isn’t a Bad Word: U.S. Agencies Must Tighten Up H5N1 Communications

MedPageToday More effective and efficient public messaging is the need of the hour. Less than a month ago, we published a pieceopens in a new tab or window suggesting that H5N1 bird flu could pose an even thornier health communications challenge than COVID-19. We offered a three-point prescription for how the U.S. government agencies most responsible for overseeing the response to this public health challenge — FDA, CDC, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) — might collaborate to speak about H5N1 with one voice, be transparent about how and when they would address the issue, and balance the paradoxical challenge of allaying fears while providing a realistic assessment of the risk to human health. But the underlying truth of this situation is that even with the best of communications plans and perfect interagency cooperation, the only real certainty about this situation is its uncertainty. This means our federal agencies must communicate what they don’t know as clearly as what they do know. And they need to invest in working with communications scientists to achieve a better understanding of how people process and understand scientific uncertainty, especially in light of a possible human outbreak.

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