Ready or Not: Here It Comes: MORE Media Driven Panic! Tomorrow's News - Today!
H1N1 Continues to Spread. LOOK! There is an H1N1 mutation that is even worse!
- Avoid Travel
- Be Afraid
- Keep Watching
Follow Up Stories: (the results of misleading reports and exaggerations) school and business closures, travel industry and tourism affected, individual heart breaking stories about the few deaths. (Can someone find a dead baby we can use?)
The Center for Disease Control (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO) and media share a goal: panic. Watch as this year’s new virus is named very similar to H1N1 instead of being given a new name. H1N1 has name recognition value that can inflame panic.
Instead of naming a new influenza as "2009-New Flu 1," they will name it 'advanced H1N1' or 'Super H1N1' or 'H1N1-A' to keep the fear alive.
Instead of naming a new influenza as "2009-New Flu 1," they will name it 'advanced H1N1' or 'Super H1N1' or 'H1N1-A' to keep the fear alive.
Naming new variations of influenza by year and 'New Flu 1', 'New Flu 2, etc., would greatly diminish panic. "New Flu" suggests the reality that every year there are new types of influenza. It would lower the panic. Reporting the facts by explaining how the 'number of cases' were determined and putting facts into the context of other cases of influenza would lower panic.
When the H1N1 virus reports began, the media, the CDC) and the World Health Organization )WHO fanned the flames of panic. The media, CDC, and WHO all benefit from public panic as more people keep watching and giving importance to what they say and do.
Every day more of us turn off the news, cancel the news papers and news magazines and go to the Internet. We can read on the CDC website (if we keep searching) that 'hundreds of thousands of people die from influenza related respiratory illnesses every year'. Anyone care to compare the number of respiratory deaths attributed to smoking VS flu?
By the way, if you add up the number of respiratory deaths attributed to various reasons, the number far exceeds the total number of people that died from respiratory illnesses! Why? Because if someone smoked and died of a respiratory illness, that death is counted as 'attributed to smoking." If the same person has flu symptoms, that death is also attributed to influenza. If that person also worked with asbestos, well .… you get the picture.
By the way, if you add up the number of respiratory deaths attributed to various reasons, the number far exceeds the total number of people that died from respiratory illnesses! Why? Because if someone smoked and died of a respiratory illness, that death is counted as 'attributed to smoking." If the same person has flu symptoms, that death is also attributed to influenza. If that person also worked with asbestos, well .… you get the picture.
Confirming cases of a specific flu, we are told by CDC and WHO, is very difficult. There are very few confirmed cases of H1N1. All influenza viruses mutate. Hundreds of thousands of deaths are attributed to influenza each year. However, the best advice we can give to prevent death by respiratory illness is to stop smoking.
The news readers (people paid to read a script) should stop providing their advice. What is their area of expertise? Stop mixing facts with opinions Why is their personal opinion relevant? In 2008, a national reporter on FOX was a great example. Here is what she said in her televised report of swine flu cases. “Eight cases have been confirmed in New York, but there will be a ton!”
What is a ton? Did she mean 2,000 people in New York will die or did she mean that the accumulative weight of the dead will reach 2,000 pounds? What rubbish! Why is that outrageous statement and the resulting panic not the subject of an investigation? (Note: this is a rhetorical question. Panic caused by any ‘reporters’ comments improves ratings).
The United States continues to be the country with the most confirmed cases of H1N1, so where are the travel alerts warning people not to visit or do business with the United Sates? Why are we not encouraged to go to Mexico, Europe or even Argentina, the number-two country with H1N1 cases, where it is safer than the United States? (More rhetorical questions. Warnings about visiting other countries generate a lot of buzz. “Last night the news reported that going to Mexico is dangerous. Should we cancel our plans?”)
If the news focused on the fact that our country is the number one place to avoid because of the swine flu, people would demand answers. The answers would be that the reports and facts are exaggerated. The real pandemic is the exaggerated reports about each new flu virus.
If the news focused on the fact that our country is the number one place to avoid because of the swine flu, people would demand answers. The answers would be that the reports and facts are exaggerated. The real pandemic is the exaggerated reports about each new flu virus.
There are two big reasons we should stop this nonsense. First, the public may eventually ignore all warnings from the media, CDC and WHO and there may one day be a report that we need to trust. Second, the crushed economies, lost school days, lost income and stress levels affects real people. There are millions living at the bottom of the economy that can’t buy food because of the lost work caused by panic. Travel industries are crushed. Airlines lay-off workers. Shops, hotels, restaurants close.
Turn to the Internet for news facts and news entertainment. For the facts, read information from original sources without interpretation. For entertainment watch the U-Tube clips of all the accidental up-skirt clips of ‘reporters’ on TV that actually think they are taken seriously. Watch as the reporters shake their heads to convey their concern, as if we think they are experts.
Final Note
What do YOU think the next news story will be?
Final Note
What do YOU think the next news story will be?
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