Briefly: because the people who die of ‘normal’ flu tend to be the old and weak. This flu seems to be killing young, strong people. This is what happened with the Spanish flu pandemic in 1918, and that’s why everyone’s worried.
Excellent article Eve, though anytime I read anything about the Tuskegee disaster, I feel ill (and yet more people need to read about it).
This current pandemic – I think in the UK tabloids have a lot to answer for. They thrive on scaremongering and having a go at the “government”. Yesterday, they were all flapping about the NHS not having enough surgical masks (which don’t actually do anything…) and obviously this is the fault of the government/liberals/immigrants (delete as appropriate, according to the paper you’re reading). This is not to say that there are no concerns whatsoever, but until the chemists come up with an antibiotic (always hard to do given how fast the flu virus mutates), we can’t really do much. Ultimately, spreading panic achieves nothing but chaos, which I secretly think is the main objective of tabloids 🙂
And it is some how better that old people die as oppose to young people?
I will read that article later, but I really think the ‘but its usually old people’ argument is pretty pathetic.
Good queston and I’m wondering the same thing:)
Briefly: because the people who die of ‘normal’ flu tend to be the old and weak. This flu seems to be killing young, strong people. This is what happened with the Spanish flu pandemic in 1918, and that’s why everyone’s worried.
This article about panic and rumour-mongering is well worth a read: http://canonical.org/~kragen/costs-lives.html
Excellent article Eve, though anytime I read anything about the Tuskegee disaster, I feel ill (and yet more people need to read about it).
This current pandemic – I think in the UK tabloids have a lot to answer for. They thrive on scaremongering and having a go at the “government”. Yesterday, they were all flapping about the NHS not having enough surgical masks (which don’t actually do anything…) and obviously this is the fault of the government/liberals/immigrants (delete as appropriate, according to the paper you’re reading). This is not to say that there are no concerns whatsoever, but until the chemists come up with an antibiotic (always hard to do given how fast the flu virus mutates), we can’t really do much. Ultimately, spreading panic achieves nothing but chaos, which I secretly think is the main objective of tabloids 🙂
And it is some how better that old people die as oppose to young people?
I will read that article later, but I really think the ‘but its usually old people’ argument is pretty pathetic.