COVID-19 Postage Stamps—Messages in a Message

THE ARTS AND MEDICINE COVID-19 Postage Stamps—Messages in a Message

Bertrand Lefrère, Msc; Amélie Recoing, PharmD, MSc; Hervé Delacour, PharmD, MSc

n living memory, no epidemic has generated a medical, and Switzerland [38]) and the United Nations series (6 stamps: scientific, social, and political response as massive, rapid, 14-19) have surcharges, indicated with a + sign, to raise addi- I and global as that of COVID-19, which quickly became a tional monies committed to charity funds. global public health emergency recognized by the World Health Most often depicted, in descending order of frequency, Organization in January 2020.1 are clinicians (n = 21), the virus (n = 14), scientists (n = 12), The commemoration of major events takes many forms, soldiers (n = 11), and patients (n = 7). Two scenes depict including the issuing of postage stamps. It is a mass me- critically ill patients, both from nations hit early and hard by dium used to commemorate events or raise public aware- the pandemic, including a faint line drawing of an intubated ness about topics of wide social interest or influence. patient in an ICU bed and an attending health worker check- Educational and financial ing IV fluids (eFigure 2 in the Supplement, detail from messages about infectious stamp 25) from China; and an upright patient being venti- Supplemental content diseases on stamps appeared lated noninvasively and attended to by an emergency or in 1904 when Danish postal intensive care health care worker, from Brazil (33). A third clerk Einar Holbøll developed the idea of raising money for tu- drawing implies a critically ill patient tended to by a critical berculosis by adding a surcharge to the sale of a “Christmas care team, fronted or led by a woman health care worker of seal” stamp2 (eFigure 1 in the Supplement). With the rise of color in heroic stance (44), 1 of a 12-part series of essential email the popular cultural significance of postage stamps has pandemic workers (including nonphysician hospital work- diminished, but they still remain a way for governments and ers and civil servants) from France. nongovernment organizations to communicate on a broad scale The virus itself is represented in both stylized (stamps and to raise funds.3 24, 38, 41, and 58) and more realistic illustrations (13, 28, We conducted a review of official postage stamps issued 34-35) in the issue. A Swiss “solidarity” stamp features a in 2020 related to the COVID-19 pandemic. We consulted an Bauhaus-like image of a globe circumscribed by icons of online list of national postal services and searched the people, the whole resolving into the coronavirus with its philatelic section of each through December 2020 to iden- spike protein array (38). tify 21 countries with pandemic-related postage series Many of the images evoke combat imagery, honoring issues comprising 62 stamps, and 1 nonnational organiza- health care workers and armed forces and blurring the dis- tion (the United Nations) with 1 issue comprising 6 stamps, tinction between them as essential to combating the pan- for a total of 22 issues or series comprising 68 stamps. In the demic. Examples include a split masked face, half-caregiver process we incidentally identified postage issues com- half-soldier (stamp 40); a soldier wearing a gas mask paired memorating pre–SARS-CoV-2 respiratory disease outbreaks with a physician flashing a victory sign (21; see also 58); including 1918 influenza, SARS, and H5N1 (eFigure 1 in the masks symbolizing army, police, firefighters, and other civil Supplement). servants (36-37); and a “superhero” health care worker with We included only official stamps whose status was veri- a floating red cape (1). fied on postal sites because nonverified copies sometimes Others communicate public health mitigation measures, circulate without validation by the national postal office or emphasizing recognition of symptoms (stamps 16, 30, 66), as part of personalized prints, which is allowed in some wearing of masks (12, 13, 36, 37, 46-51, 56-59, 67), social dis- jurisdictions when approved by a local private organization. tancing, hand washing or surface disinfection, and other bar- We obtained images of most of the series from Yvert et rier measures (14-15, 42, 47, 63-68). A French Polynesian im- Tellier, a global postage stamp company that maintains ref- age illustrates 2 women with matching floral print masks erence catalogs of global issues. separated by 6 coconuts, the recommended physical dis- The first COVID-19 stamp was issued by Iran (stamp 21) on tance of1m(43). March 17, quickly after the first isolation and identification of In general the stamps signal governments' resolve to fight SARS-CoV-2,4 followed by China on May 11 (stamps 24 and 25), the epidemic (eg, clenched fists in stamps 26, 35, 41), reas- with the 65 remaining released through December 2020. By sure their populace, and educate and motivate them about pub- comparison, the first AIDS-related stamp did not appear until lic health best practices. Monaco’s stamp, the only photo- years after the discovery of HIV. Many are commemorative, graph, shows King Albert II holding a globe rotated to Asia meaning they are issued for a short period and are not ongo- where the epidemic began with a handwritten message urg- ing national postage issues. Two national stamps (Morocco [13] ing “patience, trust, courage, [and] solidarity”(20).

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Yvert et Tellier 2626-2633

9 10 11 12 13

Yvert et Tellier 1696 Yvert et Tellier 3235

14 15 16 17 18 19 20

21 22 23 24 25 26

Yvert et Tellier 2987 © Correios (Empresa Brasileira de Correios e Telégrafos)

27 28 29 30 31 32 33

Stamp(s) Country or organization, date of issue in 2020. Artist(s). “Translation.” Series or Stamp Title. 1-8 Isle of Man, May 4. Ben Glazier, Emma Newton. Carry Us Through. 21 Iran, March 17. Alireza Zakeri. “Islamic Republic of Iran. National heroes.” 9-11 Curacao, June 18. Bianca Berends, Patrick G Jimenez Quinayas. United We 22-23 Greece, June 16. Artist unknown. “Thank you all; We stayed home and won.” Stand Against COVID-19. 24-25 China, May 11. Wang Huming, Liu Xiangping. “Dedication to fight the pandemic.” 12 United Arab Emirates, May 10. Artist unknown. Thank You Heroes. 26 Macao, June 24. Sou Farong. “Fight against the epidemic together.” 13 Morocco, April 6. Artist unknown. “Morocco united against COVID-19.” 27 Uruguay, May 13. Gabriel Casas. “National coronavirus plan.” 14-19 United Nations, August 11. Rorie Katz, Chiara Fiori, Laura Paice. “Personal 28-33 Brazil, July 8. Alan Magalhaes. “Science and technology; Health care professionals; hygiene; Physical distancing; Recognize the symptoms; Myth-busting; Benevolence; Main COVID-19 symptoms; Essential services; Communication channels; Intensive care unit.” Solidarity.” We Are All in This Together – Help Stop the Spread of COVID-19. Fight against COVID-19. 20 Monaco, June 3. Guillaume Barclay. “Patience, trust, courage, solidarity. Together facing COVID-19.”

All the images reflect a sentiment of global solidarity; mass public health efforts; and the hope of overcoming this Author Affiliations: Public Assistance Hospital of Paris, AP-HP, France (Lefrère); new medical, scientific, and human challenge. These University of Paris, UTCBS, CNRS-INSERM, Paris, France (Lefrère); Department of Virology, Bichat-Claude Bernard University Hospital, AP-HP, Paris, France stamps prove they remain a creative medium for public (Recoing); University of Paris, IAME, INSERM, Paris, France (Recoing); health messaging, especially in global regions still reliant on Department of Laboratory, Begin Teaching Military Hospital, Saint-Mandé, land mail. France (Delacour); Val-de-Grâce Military School, Paris, France (Delacour).

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36 37

34 35 38 39 40

41 42 43 44 45 46 47

48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55

63 64 65 66 67 68

Stamp(s) Country or organization, date of issue in 2020. Artist(s). “Translation.” Series or Stamp Title.

34-35 Vietnam, March 31. Pham Trung Ha. “Join hands in COVID-19 prevention 43 French Polynesia, July 31. Maryse Noguier. and control.” 44-55 France, September. Drawing, Miles Hyman; layout, Huitième jour; creation, Ben. 36-37 Czech Republic, June 24. Filip Heyduk. “Thank you.” Everyone Engaged. 38 Switzerland, April 6. Alexandra Steiner. COVID-19 Solidarity. 56-58 India, December 24. Artist unknown. Salute to COVID-19 Warriors. 39 Lebanon, January 7. Artist unknown. “Thanks to our caring heroes.” 59-62 Sri Lanka, October 9. Artist unknown. Let’s Rise Up Defeating COVID-19. 40 Ukraine, May 29. Nikita Titov. “Frontline.” 63-68 Singapore, September 4. Sophia Leow, Ken Koh, Ministry of Education. 41-42 Taiwan, July 21. Delta Design Corporation. “All out against the pandemic; COVID-19 Series I – The Soaper 5. We shall defeat COVID-19.” Taiwan Can Help.

Corresponding Author: Bertrand Lefrère, MSc, University of Paris, 1. Sun J, He WT, Wang L, et al. COVID-19: epidemiology, evolution, and UTCBS, INSERM U1267–CNRS UMR8258, 75006 Paris, France cross-disciplinary perspectives. Trends Mol Med. 2020;26(5):483-495. doi:10. ([email protected]). 1016/j.molmed.2020.02.008 Published Online: March 22, 2021. doi:10.1001/jama.2021.2139 2. Denune J. Einar Holbøll—father of Christmas seals. Linn’s Stamp News. Conflict of Interest Disclosures: None reported. December 26, 1988. Additional Contributions: We sincerely thank Yvert et Tellier for the 3. Bluefarb S. Medicine and stamps. JAMA. 1970;214(3):602. doi:10.1001/jama. contribution to the iconographic corpus, as well as La Poste, Singapore Post, 1970.03180030118044 and Iran Post. Thanks to Karen Wyckoff for her proofreading. 4. Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention. National Additional Information: Yvert et Tellier numbers in captions are a standard Microbiology Data Center, January 2020. Accessed January, 24, 2021. philatelic citation. http://nmdc.cn/nCov/en

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