Flu Fighters Not Content with Calm

[DainBramaged]

Why are health agencies peddling more and increasingly specific advice on flu preparedness, when the public is feeling pretty chill about it?

The latest Washington Post-ABC News poll shows the American public is not very worried about flu. Most people feel confident that health agencies will be able to handle a flu outbreak. But health officials don't seem content with that sort of tranquility.

Perhaps these officials are more clever and more subtle than we give them credit for. Maybe they know that if they keep escalating the barrage of flu "guidance," if the tabloids run a scary flu headline every few days and the airwaves are alive with tweets on flu, many people will dismiss it all as overblown advertisement about a mild threat -- and therefore stay calm.

But calm isn't what officials are after. "No need to panic" is so '80s.

Now, officials' aim is to fight what they claim is public complacency. We're not fearful enough. And, behind that, their goal is to keep the taps open on the flow of dollars to their own agency or project.


http://www.abcnews.go.com/Health/SwineFlu/story?id=8401968

[Fleshdancer]

1. $5 the writer of this opinion piece will blame the agencies if H1N1 becomes a big threat

I can see the headline now: "Public officials didn't do enough to warn people!"

Health agencies around the world are on alert about this one which tells me that we should be paying more attention to it...assuming we can pull ourselves away from the non-stop Michael Jackson coverage. :eyes:

[redqueen]

6. What MJ coverage?

Is this a teevee news thing?

I don't understand why people watch that crap.

[Fleshdancer]

12. Yep, it's all over the cable news

I work from home and keep it on for background noise mostly. In case you were wondering, MJ is still dead. I know this because MSNBC tells me so. :D

[CoffeeCat]

2. All of this pisses me off...

Can't the government and the corporations just be honest? Yeah, I know...that's a hilarious thought.

But come on, I'm just so tired of this nonsense.

Is the flu bad or not? Is the government providing a scare campaign to enrich their friends in big Pharma?
Or is this legitimate?

Right now, it's FEAR, FEAR, FEAR. There are many articles and pieces on the network morning shows about the
special danger to children and how schools will be breeding grounds for the Swine Flu.

Because our government is so entrenched with the corporations, we have to wonder what is true and what is hype.

When the flu circulated in the spring and late summer, there were very few deaths and the flu seemed mild. Many
have argued that when the flu "comes around again" this fall, that it could be more lethal. The question I have...has
the flu mutated or changed in ways that have made it more deadly? Is that a fact? This morning's news featured
a piece about 90,000 projected deaths from this Swine flu. That's twice as many deaths as a normal flu season. Swine flu
wasn't this deadly a few months ago. Again...did it mutate into a more virulent form?

It's such a shame that we can no longer rely on the MSM. We have to wonder about the back story and make judgments
about how much corporations are influencing the story.

As a mother with two young children, this is very upsetting.

[redqueen]

5. Talk to your doctor.

Opinions differ, but from what I'm reading & hearing there is a reason for the concern.

And yes, it is mutating.

[seabeyond]

3. they need to just send everyone to du. nt

[HERVEPA]

4. Yes, health agencies doing their jobs is certainly a major concern

:sarcasm:

[kegler14]

7. Boy you guys really aren't with it. Don't you know this is an Obama plot

to take our minds off the economy, his lack of a birth certificate and the fact that he's a Muslim?

For the sarcasm impaired, that was sarcasm. Although there are conservatives who believe the first part.

[brer cat]

8. Flu outbreaks can overwhelm hospitals

Several years ago we had a moderate outbreak when they didn't tweak the vaccine right that year. I was working in an ER then and we were swamped! We also quickly filled up all the inpatient beds. Had our peak lasted another day we would have been admitting patients to stretchers in waiting rooms, without enough staff to care for them. I worked for a small hospital and we frequently referred patients from the ER to larger facilities that had specialists we didn't have on staff. Under the best of circumstances (ie no flu outbreak in process) it was not uncommon for a hospital to delay the transfer for hours because there were no beds available. Even fairly mild complications of flu, such as dehydration, can require hours in an ER or short term inpatient admission.

I don't have a good feeling about this upcoming flu season. I'm just glad that for me now RN stands for retired nurse.

[dana_b]

9. ugh. I know what you mean

we already don't have enough beds and this is going to be a tough one. Some people already come in just because they have a bad cold and this will drown our ED. sigh.

[pipi_k]

10. The "War on Terra" is over, doncha know...

Now we gots us a full-bore "War on Influenza"


ATTEN-HUT!!! Hypodermics ready! Don't shoot till you see the skin of their arms! Forward, HARCH!

boo-yah!


;)

[madrchsod]

11. latest from argentina who has the second largest outbreak pig flu

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jCdrp6qc6PRDf-oTGRESHny1VtrgD99PK0MG0

it seems from what i have read that young people are getting hit the hardest because they did`t live through the previous pig flu outbreaks...

i guess we`ll have to follow a simple direction..."cleanliness is next to godliness":rofl: