Review: The COVID-19 pandemic needs an FDR-like rhetorical response

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Review: The COVID-19 pandemic needs an FDR-like rhetorical response

This commentary argues that the United States needs a unified federal response to mobilize the nation to address the health and economic crisis in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Although state and local leaders have actively, and sometimes aggressively, addressed the COVID-19 pandemic, neither can accomplish the enormous undertaking needed to respond. Instead, federal leaders need a unified resolve to defeat this epidemic. Unfortunately, current leadership has communicated in ways completely opposite of what is needed – providing numerous untruthful statements, giving a false sense of optimism, and using self-praise instead of providing immediate, honest, collective responses. By utilizing the communicative practices used by President Franklin D. Roosevelt when entering World War II, current leadership could unite the country towards overcoming a pandemic that is destroying more than people’s health.

|2020-04-13T14:59:49-04:00April 13th, 2020|COVID-19 Literature|Comments Off on Review: The COVID-19 pandemic needs an FDR-like rhetorical response

About the Author: Maria Brann

Maria Brann
Dr. Maria Brann, PhD, MPH, is a professor in the Department of Communication Studies in the School of Liberal Arts at IUPUI and affiliate faculty with the Injury Control Research Center at West Virginia University. She explores the integration of health, interpersonal, and gender communication. Her translational focus and mixed methods approach are woven throughout her health vulnerabilities research, which advocates for more effective communication to improve people’s health and safety. Her primary research interests focus on the study of women’s and ethical issues in health communication contexts and promotion of healthy lifestyle behaviors to improve personal and public health and safety. She researches communication at both the micro and macro levels and studies how communication influences relationships among individuals and with the social world.

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