Date   : Sun, 19 Jul 2009 16:35:40 +0100
From   : dm.hunt@... (David Hunt)
Subject: Off Topic - BeebMaster Has Finally Flipped

> Please, please, please, o intelligentsia of BBC Micro Mailing List,
> tell me that I didn't just hear these two headlines on the same
> BBC news bulletin:
> 
> 1.  Everyone is going to get swine 'flu.  We're all going to die, there
> are no vaccines for at least two months, don't go out or speak to anyone
> or touch anybody; wear a mask, quarantine everything and close all
> schools;
> 
> 2.  Everyone is encouraged to attend the biggest street party since the
> Silver Jubilee to get to know each other better.
> 

I've just had swine flu - both the additional symptoms I presented were
(according to the NHS swine flu advisory website) so severe, as to be life
threatening, that I should call 999 immediately... Um, still here, fully
recovered... 

Death has passed over me onto the 65,000 unlucky souls... According to Sky
News "Liam Donaldson, Chief Medical Officer : 65000 Could Die Of Swine Flu
In Britain" - odd because that story had vanished off their site, I could
still see it with Google though. Although, when you look at what Liam
Donaldson was talking about, these tables of figures are for planning
purposes and looks at best-average-worst case scenarios. Of course, in the
interest of selling "information" to the masses, the media opts for the
worst case scenario.

The media has (almost) everyone whipped up into frenzy, they report the
death as down to swine flu and when it's found out the death wasn't solely
down to swine flu, they just move onto the next death and stop reporting the
old one.

If the media was any way scientific, they would look for evidence that is to
the contrary to the populous panicking, plague passing, patients - passing
perplexingly peacefully. Then they'd realize there is far more to the death
than swine flu alone. If these people were ill during Autumn/Winter and
caught "normal flu" before swine flu then it'd never even make the news.

Why not run a story about how many people die of normal flu, car accidents,
ladder accidents, electrocution whilst mowing the lawn, cutting down trees
or smoking - damn, yeah, I forgot, those are old news and very avoidable.

A street party or a retro gaming convention are going to be great places to
pick up flu, whatever its variety ;)

Dave