WHO Raises Swine Flu Threat Level

Solarch writes "Late in the afternoon on Wednesday, the WHO raised the pandemic threat level for H1N1 "swine flu" to 5. Global media outlets(such as CNN, Fox News, and the BBC) preempted normal broadcast coverage and immediately published stories on their websites. To clarify, the WHO's elevation is mainly a sign to governments that the virus is spreading quickly and that steps should be taken on a governmental level to stage supplies and medicines to combat a possible pandemic. Unfortunately, broadcast coverage focused on phrases like 'pandemic imminent' (CNN marquee). In other news, patient zero, the medical term for the initial human vector of a disease, has been tentatively identified in Mexico."

Comments

Please let it be!!

[happy_place]

I get the feeling that Media outlets are DESPERATELY Hoping that this will be a Pandemic... as if they're bored or really really really like human suffering... oh wait, what's that saying about if it bleeds it's frontpage news? Sigh. --Ray PS> Would hate to die of Swine Flu, just because of what it's called... and all that it would imply if I caught it...

Re:Please let it be!!

[V50]

I agree with you to a degree, there certainly is a human element that enjoys other people's suffering. Not too complex though, it makes us feel better in comparison. :)

What I meant though, to use an example, is having part of you wish a destructive news event to occur, more for entertainment purposes.

To use an example, back in 2003, (when I was 15) I was a strong supporter of the Iraq war. I made all sorts of justifications based on human rights, WMDs (laugh all you want), Saddam being a dick, etc. The real reason I supported the Iraq invasion in '03 is because I wanted to see a war take place, I wanted exciting footage of missiles hitting Baghdad, I wanted propaganda from both sides, I wanted maps on Wikipedia with how much each side held. Part of me was even disappointed when Baghdad fell quickly. I wanted to see a nasty battle.

Criticise me as a deranged sociopath all you want, but treating the news as entertainment is far from limited to me. Most people dress it up with other reasons though, like I did. The difference is that because I was 15 at the time, I didn't really hide my true motives for supporting the Iraq invasion very far, knowing the whole time I really just wanted a big expensive exciting war drama to be broadcast over CNN.

And for all it affected me at the time, (15, Canadian, knew no Americans, let alone military personnel.), it may as well have been a war movie. Being older, (hopefully) more mature, and knowing several people who have served in Iraq and/or Afghanistan, perhaps my opinion would be a bit different, but at the time, Iraq may have been a war movie to me, and good entertainment.

Re:I'll repeat what I heard elsewhere

[Estanislao Mart�nez]

With the grand WHO total of deaths being caused by H1N12009 being EIGHT, and the most well documented death so far being a 23 year old, the whole idea that this is killing otherwise healthy (a BIG assumption, this is Mexico, not the US, the health care system and environmental conditions in Mexico City is not very good in the former and absolutely terrible in the latter case) adults is isn't founded at all.

The WHO grand total of confirmed deaths is low because confirmation of which strain was involved in each specific case is slow. The actual number of deaths so far by the strain is almost certainly significantly higher. To put it more precisely, a large proportion of the cases that have been labeled as suspected swine flu deaths will turn out to be so.

Also, I don't think your Mexican health care and environment objection holds. Given no other data, you would expect that to increase the number of deaths, but not the distribution of deaths across age groups. You need a stronger hypothesis: that the poor health care in Mexico increases the risk of death from H1N1 disproportionately among young adults and middle-aged adults will die from H1N1, compared to children and the elderly.

The one thing that's sure at this point is that our information is quite likely to have very serious holes yet, however.

Re:From a Hot Zone

[FatFreeCelery]

So long as this is going on, I'll make sure to was my hands with soap and water after using the bathroom

I hope that you continue your newly found routine even after this has gone on.