Swine Flu is exaggerated and overhyped

Do you really want to walk around with this on your face?

“A Mexican toddler in Texas has died of the new swine flu virus, the first confirmed death outside Mexico...nearly a week after the threat first emerged in Mexico, Spain reported the first case in Europe...with Germany and Austria reporting cases, bringing the number of affected countries to 9, [Dr. Keiji] Fukuda said the [World Health Organization] was moving closer to raising its pandemic alert to phase five, the second highest level possible.”

So reported Reuters today, in a screaming story confidently assuring us that this time, we're all going to die.

But before we swear off all travel, don our silly masks, and confine ourselves to our rooms indefinitely, let's get a few things straight. What we badly need, in the midst of all this doom-and-gloom confusion, is a little perspective.

Influenza is a highly contagious – yet quite common – infection, spread by airborne viruses. On an average annual basis in the United States, 5% to 20% of the population catches it; over 200,000 people are hospitalized for it; and about 36,000 people die from it.

Tragic, yes, but hardly newsworthy – let alone cause for daily media alarms that breathlessly report every single recorded diagnosis with the colorful urgency of R.K.O.'s rendition of “War Of The Worlds.” As with cancer, 'flu is just another manifestation of one of the unpleasant facts of life: people get sick, and sometimes die.

But say a new, rare, or heretofore unfamiliar strain of 'flu pops up and claims a few unlucky victims! Now there's a story that'll scare 'em. The irresistible “hook” of these stories reads thus: 'flu may be common, but this is something we haven't seen before. This is a big, bad, 'flu Version 2.0 that will sneak up on you when you're not looking and kill you (and maybe rape your mother). No one is safe anymore, so pay attention. Your lives may depend on it!

These stories circulate with such predictable frequency, you can set your watch by them. The last major hullabaloo was over Avian Influenza, or “Bird Flu.” Back in 2006, it had killed only 114 people over nine years, but that didn't stop the media firestorm that regularly warned us of a colossal global pandemic. Dateline NBC ran a ridiculous doomsday scenario that hinted, with no credible evidence, at a repeat of the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic that killed 40 million people in less than a year.

Ah, yes, the Great Influenza, the mother of all pandemics. Every time a new scare story flares up, a cadre of scientists are trotted out in front of the cameras, telling us that we're overdue for another one. Forget the fact that doctors in 1918 were working with comparatively primitive technology and medicine. Forget the fact that the average lifespan was much shorter. The public can't handle such cool, rational thinking; they need to see pictures of mass graves!

I'm no scientist or doctor, but it's clear to me that the only thing for which we're obviously overdue is another melodramatic, overhyped media event. Which says a lot, since the last one always occurred yesterday.

This scare is not a “conspiracy,” it's just the nature of mass media. They live to frighten you into submission, lest you move your finger to switch the channel to American Idol. Nor is it simply a pack of lies; 'flu is indeed a serious malady, in all its various strains. It's just a gross exaggeration compounded by shameless speculation, lacking any meaningful perspective.

The reason these scare stories, including the present panic over Swine Flu, are potentially more dangerous than the contagions that sparked the alarm in the first place, is twofold.

First, if you scare people badly enough, they'll stop spending money. By that, I mean they'll refuse to buy certain products that have been targeted by the scare. Remember Mad Cow in the UK? After a resurgence in the fear of an outbreak of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy in 1995 – aided by a screaming media – Britain's meat industry had practically ground to a halt. We're constantly warned that a global pandemic will have devastating effects on economies, but nobody ever mentions the economic devastation wrought by baseless fearmongering.

Second, if you scare people badly enough, they'll submit to whomever promises them protection and a solution. Enter big government. In March 1996, the EU's Veterinary Committee met in Brussels, and voted 14-1 for a draconian export ban on British beef products. This ban lasted ten years, during which the UK government, under pressure from the EU, compelled British farmers to destroy 8,074,600 livestock. The financial cost to farmers, the meat industry, and British taxpayers in general was catastrophic. For a full analysis of this travesty, consult Christopher Booker's and Richard North's timely tome Scared To Death.

The more dire the threat seems, the more willingly people give up their freedom and their money. With the arrival of each new exotic medical scare, it's important to examine history and cool our heads before we take the media at their word and leap off the cliff.

Look, we're all going to die someday. Our bodies are vulnerable to physical trauma and countless infections. We can never make ourselves 100% safe from everything. To vainly try, and to vainly fret, is no way to live our lives.

So I'm not too worried here. I'm going to continue to do what I've always done: wash my hands and shower regularly, keep my mouth off other people's drinks, and generally practice good hygiene. And if I see someone on the street who's obviously ill, I might stand back a few feet.

Beyond that, there's not much I can do. So why torture myself by watching the news?