Les Panafricaines firmly condemn the insulting remarks made on the French channel LCI

PRESS RELEASE

The African women journalists network “Les Panafricaines” condemns with the utmost firmness the insulting, racist remarks made on the air of the news channel LCI on April 1, 2020 by the Professor Jean-Paul Mira, Head of the intensive care unit at Cochin Hospital.

Interrogating in Professor Camille Locht, research director at Inserm on the subject : « Covid-19 treatment: avenues for BCG vaccine », Jean-Paul Mira asks the following question: “If I can be provocative, shouldn’t this study be done Africa, where there is no mask, no treatment, no reanimation, a little like it has been done for some studies on AIDS, where prostitutes were asked to try things because we know they are highly exposed and they don’t protect themselves. What do you think ?”.

Professor Locht endorsed these words by replying: “You are right, and besides that we are thinking about a study in Africa, precisely to do this same type of approach with BCG, a placebo. ”

Thus, it is simply proposed and approved by the interlocutor, to use Africa as a laboratory and therefore Africans as guinea pigs on which an experiment would be carried out.

Demonstrating a total ignorance of African realities and in a shameless condescending approach, Jean Paul Mira uses clichés to present the caricature of a continent where people would not protect themselves, where there would be nothing: « no masks, no treatment, no reanimation. »

We invite Professor Mira to question his colleagues from the hospitals of France who are sure to remind him that what he says about the African continent is first valid for the country in which he operates.

That there are only 7,000 intensive care beds  when Germany has 27 000, that Parisian hospital staff are in dire need of masks and that to conclude, no country in the world has for the moment appropriate treatment to combat this unprecedented pandemic.

Africa and its people have no lessons to learn from these kind of individuals . Whatever their difficulties, Africans approach them with dignity and draw their strength from their convictions.

Jean-Paul Mira’s comments cannot be considered as a mistake. By starting his question with “if I can be provocative”, Jean-Paul Mira is perfectly aware of the scandalous scope and therefore reprehensible nature of his words.

No excuse can be found for him, just like Professor Locht who begins his response by agreeing with his interlocutor.

If we note with satisfaction the reaction of the management board of the Paris Hospitals in an update published yesterday on their site and in which, Martin Hirsch, its director says he is “shocked” by the words, we cannot however consider the apologies and regrets that are expressed by Jean-Paul Mira.

Furthermore, we express our surprise at the press release from Inserm, which qualifies the video published in several social networks as “truncated” when it has not been the subject of any editing or alteration of any kind.

We ask LCI to assume its responsibilities as broadcaster and appeal to the French regulatory authority, the CSA, guardian of the fight against discrimination, to take steps to call LCI firmly to order.

The network of African women journalists, Les Panafricaines, has its headquarter in Casablanca in Morocco. It brings together hundreds of journalists across the 54 countries of the continent and African journalists working in other media worldwide.

The network’s mission is to contribute to a citizen awareness on the responsibility of media and their role in building public opinion.

Alone we go faster, together we go further” African proverb