Swine Flu Déjà Vu?
As more cases of Swine Flu are reported across the globe, two kinds of opportunism seem to be spreading as well. First, non-profits spin the story to seek funding or media coverage for whatever portion of their work might overlap with the rising pandemic. Some are more relevant-and actually engaged-than others. Second, businesses might use the health scare for their own purposes.
In Egypt, pigs are being slaughtered to "prevent" the spread of swine flu in a country where even a single case of the illness has not yet been confirmed.
Saulo Araujo, Grassroots International Program Coordinator for Brazil & Mesoamerica, and I traveled to the People's Summit of the Americas with the Hemispheric Social Alliance (HSA). The HSA is composed of networks, social movements and organizations from across the Americas that are primarily opposed to free trade. Its beginnings were in the Belo Horizonte, Brazil People's Summit in 1997 in anticipation of the Santiago,