Some much needed perspective for the latest media-induced “health crisis.”
Mass vaccinations started in October, but within weeks reports started coming in of people developing Guillain-Barré syndrome, a paralyzing nerve disease, right after taking the shot. Within two months, 500 people were affected, and more than 30 died. Amid a rising uproar and growing public reluctance to risk the shot, federal officials abruptly canceled the program Dec. 16.
Read the full article at Wired.
Tags: Bacon, I don't dig no swine, immunize, influenza, media induced crisis, Mexico, panic, pigs, pork, public health, Stupid, stupid media, swine flu, The sky is falling, vaccinations
Your Daily Chum 
April 28, 2009 at 9:59 am |
I wonder where the happy medium is then? Because people are actually dying from this flu virus and it is definitely contagious. It’s actually a function of the media to let us know that things like this are going on in the world. Shouldn’t we be aware of outbreaks of disease. Even SARS and bird flu killed people, just not us or anyone we personally knew. I’m not saying that they’re not blowing it out of proportion, but the media letting us know about things like this is really why they’re there. Much better use of media than for news on Madonna falling off a horse.
I mean if we never take an outbreak of disease seriously because there’s always too much media coverage, then that’s a problem like crying wolf. Because some day it may be our country where disease is spreading and we’ll all think it’s just the media causing people to get hysterical.