On May 20, 2014 UNICEF released a statement where they expressed their appreciation of the U.S. Government not using vaccination efforts as a means to gather intelligence or for military purposes (1). When the hunt for Osama Bin Laden was underway, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) launched a pseudo-vaccination campaign in Pakistan with the intention of discovering the DNA sequencing of the Bin Laden Family for identification purposes (3). This analysis looks at the various parties involved for this particular operation that spurred the statement as well as looking at the overall public health effects of this decision.

Leadership In this CIA operation, the leadership included those in the CIA as well as those with Homeland Security and the Department of Defense. All stakeholders had one intention, which was about the defense of the Nation and not the public health implications. From a stakeholder perspective, if other members of the Federal Government were involved in this decision making process there could have been the potential for the operation being found out before a DNA sequence could be obtained. Decision makers had to determine the length that they were willing to go in an effort to capture the most wanted man in the world, or they could just make a formal apology to the world saying that they wouldn’t do it again after the fact.

Norms and Standards If the number one goal of a nation is a self serving interest, then the United States proved that point with this action. Fired with the fuel of the September 2001 terroristic attacks, the U.S. was out to prove a point as well as saving face in other political arenas. All of this aside, the public health implications were effected as well as a tarnish of trust and reputation to the free world. This decision of self-serving interests compromises future endeavors, and is in direct opposition of the Institute of Medicine defining public health as “what we, as a society, do collectively to assure the conditions in which people can be healthy” (4).

Relevance of the Policy to the State The rebuilding of trust is imperative for the reputation of the state to be reconciled in the public health care initiative field. While most governments probably understand why the U.S. made this decision, the layperson could feel violated and this could affect the outcome of future health initiatives. Specific to this case, there has already been an armed backlash against American immunization programs where 56 people have died. Furthermore, there has been a resurgence of polio in Pakistan. Of the 77 cases of polio documented worldwide so far in 2014, 79% have been in Pakistan (2). This type of outbreak has the potential to affect the peoples of all nations due to the globalization nature of society.

Monitoring In reality, compliance in this situation is not something that will be monitored by any government to include the United States. This decision was based off of a National security problem, which will always trump all policies and procedures. It would be prudent on part of the WHO and/or the United Nations to attempt monitoring, but strategically the government could task out a Special Forces group to instigate the same sort of scenario, and they do not have to report to either organization. A simple apology is not enough to ensure nothing like this would ever happen again.

Resources

1. Unicef.org. (2014). Statement on the United States Government’s Announcement on Vaccination Campaigns. New York, 20 May 2014. Accessed 30 June 2014. Available at: http://www.unicef.org/media/media_73575.html

2. Krieger, Mike. (2014). US Government Admits Using Fake Vaccination Programs to Gather Intelligence and Swears it won’t do it Again. Liberty Blitzkrieg Blog. Accessed 30 June 2014. Available at: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-05-20/us-govt-admits-using-fake-vaccination-programs-gather-intelligence-swears-it-wont-do

3. Scientific American. (2013). How the CIS’s Fake Vaccination Campaign Endangers Us All. 16 April 2013. Vol. 308 Issue 5. Accessed 30 June 2014. Available at: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-cia-fake-vaccination-campaign-endangers-us-all/

4. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. (2010). Public Health Ethics. 12 April 2010. Accessed 30 June 2014. Available at: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/publichealth-ethics/