The media wants you to panic

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I will concede that the theoretical scenario of an engineered virus as a bio-weapon is plausible, but I've just seen ZERO evidence that this is the case with Covid-19. Not saying it is 100% impossible, but without some evidence to back that up, it remains nothing more than a conspiracy theory.

If this was a movie plot sure... but the virus doesn’t say “chinese??? Do not infect”... it says “human??? Infect!”... so you couldn’t really do this without possibly killing people you are close to or even yourself... it’s not that realistic of an idea... poison gas is... but not weaponized viruses...

[Deleted User 15225]

The original story that has been hushed up was that the virus was smuggled out of a Winnipeg bio lab by a woman doctor who worked there since 2014 but was a Chinese agent.Then brought to a Wuhan bio lab.What happened after that is unknown.

Believe what you like but there is more behind this than meets the eye.

What a fucking moron you are.

[Musicrewired]

The WDIV / Click On Detroit app has 6 stories this afternoon not related to the Coronavirus, including 2 shootings, a charge of racism, a b&e, drunk driving and a hit & run.

There's some of your balance returning to the news. Good to see people are getting back to their business.

Have you arranged for any unlawful assembly yet? We've been watching for it.

[The Constant Browser]

Do you think news directors and publishers are sitting at editorial meetings deciding, “How can we panic our readers/listeners/readers today?”

Almost anything much bigger than a card game is on hold, all forms of entertainment stopped. Bars and restaurants closed. No organized sports. What should the media say or do? Here is today’s CoronaVirus statistics, now back to what’s left of your life?

If your were in Florida with a Category 5 hurricane just offshore, or with a serious blizzard with a foot or more of snow and sub zero temperatures coming, I think the media would be giving it attention. In those scenarios most of life is still going on, where here almost everything is now stopped.

What should the media do? Hammer the dangers of the virus and the best ways to be safe, and constantly update treatment and care information.

[proxima3]

It wouldn't hurt the media to put things in a little context.

A little over a week ago, the mortality rate for the coronavirus in America was around 3.5%. Today it is closer to 1.5%. Wouldn't this information ease the panic just a little bit?

Back in 2009 the H1N1 virus was killing a lot more people. Was there similar media coverage of that?

[bmw]

It wouldn't hurt the media to put things in a little context.

A little over a week ago, the mortality rate for the coronavirus in America was around 3.5%. Today it is closer to 1.5%. Wouldn't this information ease the panic just a little bit?

Back in 2009 the H1N1 virus was killing a lot more people. Was there similar media coverage of that?

The rate is in fact already down to 1.7%. And this is largely because of ramped up testing efforts over the past several days. I expect it to, within the next week or so, fall to closer to South Korea's rate of 0.8%.

As to H1N1 in 2009, the CDC's stats are as follows:
-61 million people in the US infected
-275,000 people in the US hospitalized
-12,500 people dead

Granted, this is a very low mortality rate, but still, 12,500 people is a lot of dead people.

So didn't President Obama prepare our healthcare system back then for what we are facing today? No? Huh.

[Rate This]

It wouldn't hurt the media to put things in a little context.

A little over a week ago, the mortality rate for the coronavirus in America was around 3.5%. Today it is closer to 1.5%. Wouldn't this information ease the panic just a little bit?

Back in 2009 the H1N1 virus was killing a lot more people. Was there similar media coverage of that?

The rate is in fact already down to 1.7%. And this is largely because of ramped up testing efforts over the past several days. I expect it to, within the next week or so, fall to closer to South Korea's rate of 0.8%.

As to H1N1 in 2009, the CDC's stats are as follows:
-61 million people in the US infected
-275,000 people in the US hospitalized
-12,500 people dead

Granted, this is a very low mortality rate, but still, 12,500 people is a lot of dead people.

So didn't President Obama prepare our healthcare system back then for what we are facing today? No? Huh.

Actually they established a task force and appointed some pandemic response people and then Trumps folks got rid of the whole pandemic team in a DHS reorganization. So there WAS progress on pandemics from the previous administration. It was seen as pointless by the new people and then Trump pretended to not know ANYTHING about the reorganization of DHS... give me a fucking break.

[proxima3]

Actually, Obama waited until 1,000 people had died before he declared an emergency. And over 10,000 died after that declaration.

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Actually, Obama waited until 1,000 people had died before he declared an emergency. And over 10,000 died after that declaration.

They declared an emergency in short order — with 3 weeks and got the ball rolling on handling it. I’m not expecting day of response times but Trump took 7 weeks of kicking and screaming and denying it existed. Obama set up the pandemic response team so that next time we’d be ready respond faster. Trump axed it and fired all the people. Obamas original response isn’t the issue, what is the issue is that he tried to fix it for next time and Trump came in and destroyed those preparations... you know... the ones that we could use right about now...

[proxima3]

They declared an emergency in short order — with 3 weeks and got the ball rolling on handling it. I’m not expecting day of response times but Trump took 7 weeks of kicking and screaming and denying it existed. Obama set up the pandemic response team so that next time we’d be ready respond faster. Trump axed it and fired all the people. Obamas original response isn’t the issue, what is the issue is that he tried to fix it for next time and Trump came in and destroyed those preparations... you know... the ones that we could use right about now...

Trump stopped flights from China two months ago and got criticized for it.

Obama's initial response is relevant. It must have been nice to have a media on his side that didn't help induce panic.

[Rate This]

They declared an emergency in short order — with 3 weeks and got the ball rolling on handling it. I’m not expecting day of response times but Trump took 7 weeks of kicking and screaming and denying it existed. Obama set up the pandemic response team so that next time we’d be ready respond faster. Trump axed it and fired all the people. Obamas original response isn’t the issue, what is the issue is that he tried to fix it for next time and Trump came in and destroyed those preparations... you know... the ones that we could use right about now...

Trump stopped flights from China two months ago and got criticized for it.

Obama's initial response is relevant. It must have been nice to have a media on his side that didn't help induce panic.

If he had gotten out in front of it and had his people on the same page and been decisive he'd be in better shape. Instead he pretended it didn't exist and insisted everything was OK when it wasn't and a whole bunch of other stupidity. He needs to figure out what taking charge of a situation means. Clearly he missed that class.

[696lover]

The original story that has been hushed up was that the virus was smuggled out of a Winnipeg bio lab by a woman doctor who worked there since 2014 but was a Chinese agent.Then brought to a Wuhan bio lab.What happened after that is unknown.

Believe what you like but there is more behind this than meets the eye.

I have seen a few versions of this. What is proven is that China and the PLA have been very aggressively spying via the Thousand Talents program. The head of biochem at Harvard was not only passing on research but recruiting for them. Several Chinese grad students at University of Michigan have been caught stealing research and actively spying on US headquarters. And something happened at the biolab in Canada, and Wuhan is the location of a PLA biowarfare lab.

What part is typical government lying and coverups by China and what part was planned? Who knows.

[Bobbert]

This is a global pandemic. I am a molecular biologist (albeit not a virologist, but have extensive work in viral genomes) and there have been several experts in virology and epidemiology who put the number of infections at 40-60 million in the US with mortality numbers around 1 million. 12-18 months to gain immunity which means this may flare up again in the fall (if it turns out to be seasonal).

The virus is mutating as we speak and will undoubtedly be very difficult to pin down in the immediate future of research.

Yes you can take the same steps as influenza prevention but the difference is that this genome is novel. No one has an immunity. It's a respiratory infection...do we have enough ventilators? Beds? No. Mortality rates are 10x (at least) higher than influenza.

So, yeah, putting it at the forefront of all news outlets is not a waste.

I’m sorry. I, too, am a scientist and completely disagree with you. I believe the number of cases to be far greater than reported and thusly, more recoveries than reported. According to published data, the fatality rate is around 3-3.5%. Most in the medical field believe as I do that it’s likely closer to 1% because it’s simply not possible to test or monitor those who have the disease and those who do not.

We’ll know soon enough. Certainly, approaching COVID-19 with an abundance of caution isn’t necessarily a bad thing. However, blowing this out of proportion is wrong and using the deaths of thousands of people fodder for political pandering is despicable.

I’m not big on conspiracy theories but I will say this. This virus is real. But, the engineered panic surrounding it feels like a concoction to begin a civil war. And that should scare the hell out of all of us.

One thing I don't understand is the "acceptable losses" approach taken towards 20,000 flu deaths, and the "zero tolerance" approach taken to the corona virus. I understand what people are saying about percentages and probability, but 20,000 deaths are still a lot of deaths.

It reminds me of the Ferris Wheel scene in The Third Man when Orson Welles talks about how little you care about people dying when you see them only as faraway dots.

[fuzzpower]

Turn off all the news. That’s what I did. I’m not falling for their hype.