Covid-19 and Social Stigma in Hospitals: A New Epidemic of Signification?

ABSTRACT

Little is known about COVID-19 related stigma and its specific impact both on medical staff and on the care they provide in hospitals in Mexico. In this article I highlight the stigma that doctors who treat COVID-19 in Mexico City hospitals both experience and practice; explore the impact of that stigma on the care they provide and on their own suffering; and describe and discuss how they respond to it. Anthropological knowledge elucidates opportunities to encourage this new “epidemic of signification” related to stigma to become a pandemic of dignity.

RESUMEN

Poco se conoce sobre el impacto del estigma relacionado con el COVID-19 en el personal médico y en la atención que provee en México. En este artículo, analizo el estigma que los médicos que atienden COVID-19, en los hospitales de la Ciudad de México, experimentan y producen; exploro el impacto del estigma en la atención que proporcionan y en su sufrimiento; y describo y discuto cómo responden a ello. El conocimiento antropológico dilucida oportunidades para propiciar que esta nueva epidemia de significado relacionada con el estigma se convierta en una pandemia de dignidad.

KEYWORDS:

• Mexico
• COVID-19
• social stigma
• doctors
• hospitals

Disclosure statement

The author has no conflicts of interest.

Notes

1. Monica Maccise, 2020 President of the National Council to Prevent Discrimination (CONAPRED Mexico), in press conference on Coronavirus in Mexico, 03 April. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyENkPxiZS0

2. The perception of risk, I have developed in relation to COVID in Muñoz In pressa, is an aspect linked to stigma and discrimination.

3. José Luis Alomía Zegarra, “COVID-19 Mexico: Accumulated cases per million inhabitants, as of October 11, 2020”, Press conference on Coronavirus in Mexico, October 13, 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hUkfEIXIzM&t=862s

4. Private hospitals were not considered at the beginning of the hospital reconversion strategy, in Mexico City, therefore they were not selected.

5. José Luis Alogia Zegarra, “Deaths from COVID-19 in health personnel”, Press conference on Coronavirus in México, October 14, 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlmQrYP1TLs&t=1811s

6. When there is more than one informant with the same code, to identify them, they are differentiated with numbers.

7. Stigma and discrimination are contingent and liable to change in a way that is not always predictable and linear. An example of this is how in some hospital contexts this practice was rejected, but not in others. In the period in which I did fieldwork, there were some Mexican projects for the manufacture of capsules in the country and have been used for COVID in hospitals in Mexico City, althought they had different purposes such as tuberculosis or meningitis (Rendón and Castañeda 2020).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (Mexican Science and Technology Council): “Support for scientific research, technological development and health innovation in light of COVID-19 contingency”.

Notes on contributors

Rubén Muñoz Martínez

Rubén Muñoz Martínez is Full professor/researcher at Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social (CIESAS), México. He has conducted investigations in Europe and Latin America regarding HIV, mental health, drug use and COVID-19.