Few mainstream movies spend big budgets on ensuring scientific accuracy, but Steven Soderbergh's 2011 movie 'Contagion' had a team of advisors checking everything from the script to the props. CNBC talked to a couple of them to see how the movie holds up in the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic.
He was initially hesitant about getting overly involved with a Hollywood movie because of what he referred to as the "inside joke in the public health community." Prior to "Contagion," the best-known film about an infectious disease was "Outbreak," starring Dustin Hoffman, which took some real liberties when it came to scientific accuracy.
After the movie was released, epidemiologists took advantage of the public interest by creating a surveillance tool known as "flunearyou" that tracked seasonal flu rates by asking members of the public to share their symptoms. Boston Children's Hospital's chief innovation officer John Brownstein, who led the team behind the flunearyou website, even hosted a watch party.
"Anonymized, aggregate data could play a big role and we don't need to give away our rights if more people choose to get involved," he said.Another scientist, Natasha Griffith, was asked to consult on the film while working at UCLA, where she directed the operations and safety program for the university's high-containment research facilities
After advising the filmmakers in Los Angeles, she flew to Chicago to supervise the development of the lab used in the film, ensuring the accuracy of props like test tubes, pipettes and suits worn by the actors. Griffith recalled that even the smallest details, like the speed at which the centrifuge was running samples, were accurate. She used cranberry juice and apple to color the samples, so they were the correct shade before and after they were exposed to the virus.
"In a real biocontainment lab you can't have fingerprints on those stainless steel surfaces because you are in a suit," she said. "If you saw a fingerprint, it would be a huge violation."What did they miss?When he saw the videos ofgallivanting on beaches and ignoring the shelter-in-place guidelines, it struck him that the film could have done more to educate younger populations.
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