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Swine flu...how much is hysteria?
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Swine flu...how much is hysteria?  Firstly let me say I do not mean to trivialise the danger of this virus and the people it has killed and those yet to suffer. What I am trying to do is gain some perspective, and welcome your input and/or comments on my thoughts. Mexico City has a population similar to the entire population of Australia, albeit crammed in to a much smaller space. The world seems to be going to panic stations out of ignorance because the quality of information coming out of Mexico is apparently quite poor. Evidently there have been something like 2 to 3 thousand infections, with deaths approaching 160. No information is available as to the age of the victims, other contributing medical conditions that make victims more susceptible etc. (Death rates due to influenza and related respiratory complaints like pneumonia are extremely high in the elderly and frail, the very young, and those with other health issues such as diabetes etc.) Sufferers in other countries (particularly those with a more temperate climate than Mexico) do not seem to be as severely affected as sufferers in Mexico. Could this be that people in the more temperate zones are more accustomed to contact with regular flu and so have a higher tolerance to the symptoms? If this pandemic is so threatening to world-wide health, why haven't we shut down international travel to/from the countries with confirmed infections? Some sobering statistics that make me question the hysteria being generated in the media about this, from the Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing; "The median number of deaths in Australia, from 1997 to 2006, from influenza and pneumonia is 2,715 with a range of 1,898 (1999) to 3,566 (2003). In 2006 (the latest year for which data has been released) there were 2,715 deaths attributed to influenza and pneumonia. (Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), International Classification of diseases (ICD) codes 10-18 )." If this many Aussies are dying of regular influenza and pneumonia each year, the mind boggles as to what the world-wide toll would be. Maybe I am missing something, but new strains of 'flu emerge every year and circle the globe rapidly and with ease thanks to rapid international air-travel, and obviously kill many thousands (if not millions) in their wake. It makes me wonder if there is something we haven't been told, or whether the media hasn't become a little bored with global warming, global economic crisis etc. |
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I think you are right about the media creating the hype. The point they kept hammering home was that it transferred from animals, leaving unsaid but inferring the similarity (in that respect only) with the avian flu and hiv even. The morning after I wrote the post the number dead in Mexico was revised down from 169 to 12! I see that a couple of days later it is climbing again, but with few new deaths identified. It makes it difficult to pick out the real meaning when the media cloud everything for the sake of hyping a story.
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