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Never in my life have I spoken to as many scientists as in the last month. Determined not to comment on what we do not know, we decided to have an epidemiologist, a virologist, an expert in infectious diseases every night in the SER, someone who could translate the figures that came first from China, after Italy, finally from Spain . I have to thank many of them, because some were in the day-to-day work of a hospital, the availability to get on the phone after exhausting days of work and answer simple questions, formulated from absolute ignorance and with no basis other than observing the data and reality, which is the only thing we journalists have experience on this subject. With infinite patience they were untangling the knot that had been made to us throughout the day. Even today, when the epidemic escalates relentlessly - dangerously among the health workers themselves - we always find someone willing to calmly disclose their knowledge. Very few downplayed the importance of an unknown virus circulating in an interconnected world, none raised more alarm than necessary, but all emphasized avoiding the collapse of the health system. I have not found identical speeches between them, and when the conversation landed on the public steps to take, especially at first, the differences were more apparent. We are puzzled that science is not monolithic. Non-believers run the risk of expecting from science a perfect substitute for the God of those who do believe: unique, clear and above all infallible answers. We know this is not the case, but we do not consider it until it is our turn. And now it's up to all of us at once and in very dramatic circumstances. Science is alive, it operates on changing processes and its makers never tire of saying it every time a headline, full of good faith, announces the imminence of a vaccine or the flattening of a curve. There are battles that take more time than writing a story.
They have always been there, we have counted their hardships with the cuts in Health, we have been outraged by the contempt for research, the wages of misery, the flight of talents. And now we are as always, and as never, in your hands. I don't want to be forgotten when all this happens. @PepaBueno
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