‘Contagion’ True Story: It’s Not Based on Real Events, But Is Scientifically Accurate



Contagion

Contagion is not based on real events, but the science behind the film is largely accurate.

Is Contagion the movie based on real events? Is there a true story behind it? No, but the director of the film worked hard to make the plot as realistic as possible, in terms of how accurate the science behind the fake “contagion” is. He even solicited advise from multiple scientific advisors, to make the depiction of a global epidemic as accurate as possible. For that reason, many people watching the film might ask themselves: could the coronavirus outbreak end up like the film Contagion?

In the movie, an infectious virus originates in Hong Kong, and the virus is carried from bats, to pigs, until finally to humans. The virus quickly spreads around the world, becoming a deadly global pandemic as scientists race to create a vaccine.

So no, Contagion is not based on a true story, but there’s a reason why the film has skyrocketed in popularity since the coronavirus outbreak began — it feels very similar.

Here’s what you need to know:


How the Science of ‘Contagion’ Is Modeled as Accurately as Possible to Possible Real-Life Events

Contagion was made with the help of several scientific advisors, many of whom stayed on set throughout filming. Veterinary pathologist Tracey McNamara was one of those advisors. She told BuzzFeed News, “If people are watching it again, and if federal and state officials are watching it again, I hope they’re realizing that the movie was really about what can happen with a novel pandemic threat, and I think people should have taken it much more seriously.”

McNamara continued, “I wish people had paid closer attention to it when the film came out, because it really was a warning to the federal government that this could happen and you need to prepare.” McNamara, and other scientific advisors, provided input on how to depict an infectious epidemic as accurately as possible.

One thing that “really rang true in that film,” McNamara said, “is when someone at a press conference asks the character who works for the CDC if this virus had been weaponized, and his response is, ‘Mother Nature weaponized it. And that’s also very, very real because that’s what we’ve been warning people about for 20 years.”

Here are some of the aspects of Contagion that are factually accurate:

  • Kate Winslet’s character’s statistical claim that the average person touches their face 2-3,000 times a day
  • The time it takes for scientists to create an effective vaccine (McNamara told BuzzFeed News: “In the film, it took a long time to develop a vaccine that wasn’t immediately available, and then they had to have a lottery to see if you would even get the vaccine. That rings true because to get a vaccine to market and approved by the FDA, it’s a very lengthy process. I believe that, yes, people are working hard on the vaccine for the coronavirus, but I think antivirals will be more important in the short term.”)
  • the capacity for animals to carry viruses that then infect humans (scientists believe coronavirus came from an animal market in Wuhan, China)

And here are some aspects of Contagion that are scientifically impossible or inaccurate:

  • The ‘nipah’ vaccine could never happen (from the CDC: “Influenza and Nipah have incompatible genomes that are not capable of recombination in nature.”)
  • the time it takes for scientists to create an effective vaccine (this is mentioned above as slightly accurate, though others have argued it to be inaccurate — the CDC said, “Assuming a vaccine can be created — that could take more time than 4 to 6 months.”)

Contagion Movie & Coronavirus: Fans Notice Chilling Similarities Between the Real-Life Pandemic & the Film

Yes, there are a lot of creepy similarities between the real-life coronavirus and the plot line of Contagion. For example, in Contagion, a virus is carried from a bat, to a pig, to an animal market, where a chef comes into contact with the infected meat, and then passes it on to the first human infection: a character played by Gwyneth Paltrow.

In real life, scientists currently believe that the coronavirus came from an animal market in Wuhan, China, and that the virus passed from bats, to pangolins, to humans. Steven Soderbergh, the director of Contagion, has not spoken out about the resurgence of his film’s popularity during the coronavirus outbreak. However, he did talk about how unsettling it was to learn about the spread of pandemics, at the time that Contagion was first released.

“There were two things that were unsettling,” Soderbergh said about his research, in 2011. “One is that everyone you spoke to said, ‘We’re due for a big one.’ And some of the stories from the people who go out and parachute into the situations, how politics prevented them from doing their work, are really depressing.”

Soderbergh continued, Where they literally show up somewhere where there’s been an outbreak of a treatable disease and they’re there with supplies ready to go in. And because a volatile political situation existed, they weren’t allowed in to keep people from dying. They don’t have jurisdiction anywhere. You have to ask them to come. They have to be invited.”

Scott Barns, the screenwriter of Contagion, has spoken out about the coronavirus outbreak. He said in early March, per IndieWire, “It’s stunning to me that our administration can’t put out a clear message on how people can stay safe and what our tools are for understanding the current spread. There’s a video on YouTube of a song they did in Vietnam about hand-washing and how important it is. Why isn’t our government putting out public service messages about how to stay safe? That isn’t that hard.”




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