Basically, "science journalism in
Bosnia was invented by me," and in fact, even today, Jelena
Kalinic in Bosnia is the only science journalist. She explains
this herself on the sidelines of a seminar held at Sissa in
Trieste. "I studied biology," Kalicin explains, "but there is
a lot of corruption in my country, so I turned to science
journalism, even though there are still few science institutes
in Bosnia. And to better do her job, she collaborates as a
'stringer' for Voice of America and, most importantly, runs a
website, Nauka govoni naukagovori.ba (Science Speaks). "I give
training to students who write for the site, and I teach them
how to do science journalism. When funds are available, we also
do courses, interactive seminars." But what is the approach
Bosnians have with this area? "In Bosnia and throughout the
Western Balkans there is really a low level of scientific
knowledge and very few have confidence in vaccines." No
surprise, given also that "often the press is controlled by
politics." But distrust of science sometimes results in tragedy:
recently a two-month-old baby died of whooping cough and two
other boys of measles; in Serbia, too, a baby died from the
aftermath of whooping cough. In particular, "many people are
against the papilloma vaccine: there is a belief that it drives
sexual promiscuity." It is no coincidence that "people are
becoming more and more conservative, more and more religious:
there is a process of desecularization going on" and this is
frightening. Throughout the area "governments are not very
interested in Covid, they don't import vaccines, in fact I'm
going to do it today here in Italy."
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