Nothing to sneeze at
Has swine flu made a return?
Has swine flu made a return? I hope not but a number of newspapers have been running stories about the increasing numbers of death from this disease. But I think the medical profession is going to have a hard time convincing the media to pick up this story and run with it. The media caught a cold last time (if you'll pardon the pun), convinced that there were going to be tens of thousands of deaths - as it turned out there were about 500. This time, as last year, the problem in obtaining media coverage (and thereby encouraging people to get vaccinated) remains the same: health bosses keeping their cards close to their chests and releasing precious little facts. "A person has died from swine flu" is no longer a story. The press need to know if it's a man, woman, their age, where they lived, if they were healthy or not (and if not, what were their 'complications') etc etc. But we'll never be told any of that. The old-fashioned concept that "We're the experts and we know best" still prevails in the NHS. Fortunately the public are no longer fooled by this patronising tone and are not going to risk being vaccinated on the say-so of a few vague tales about deaths from swine flu.
Published: December 20, 2010
Have your say
I love that you've phrased vaccination as a risk! As a generally healthy guy, I prefer the "risk" of catching flu to the risks that are associated with today's vaccines.
Posted by Expat Marra on 22 December 2010 at 19:37