Appearing and spreading in China and then to the wider world in the winter of 2019, the COVID-19 pandemic is definitely an issue that calls for STS research, practice, and action of all kinds and on every scale from the molecular to the global.
As a sentinel of the terrible human cost of the disease, East Asia deserves the attention and efforts of STS, and EASTS will need to play its part. As long ago as early February, informal communications took place among editors in Asia, later
joined by others in Australia, Europe, and the United States. Initiatives now include
the establishment of a platform for the COVID-19 pandemic at the Disaster-STS Research Network (organized by former 4S president and EASTS editor Kim Fortun) and planned forums later this year at the 4S/ASST conference and the Korean STS
Society conference. Meanwhile, with the help of Duke University Press, our thematic issue on care in translation (14.1) has been included in its "Care in Uncertain Times" syllabus source pack (www.dukeupress.edu/Explore-Subjects/Syllabi/Care-in-Uncertain-Times-Syllabus), access to which is free during the pandemic.
