Swine Flu: What is a Greater Threat -- the Swine Flu or Swine News Media and Politicians?

Which photo is the most likely source of something that will make you sick? Swine, Swine flu virus, and Swine reporter.

Swine Flu Outbreak/Swine Journalism

How serious is the Swine Flu outbreak that has killed at least 86 Mexican residents and has spread into the United States and even as far as New Zealand?

Flu pandemics are nothing new, though threats of horrible outbreaks have fortunately not panned out recently, it’s been 41years since the 1968 massive outbreak while other massive outbreaks plagued the United States in 1957 and 1918.

The challenge we face is getting accurate, timely information, and it’s hard to trust getting an honest answer from the news media who is more concerned with their political agendas, sensationalism, and the quest for ratings and circulation than any attempt to provide vital information to the public they serve.

While we generally applaud Fox News for their unbiased coverage which gives Americans who don’t subscribe to the philosophies of the radical left, Fox news can resort to some of the shoddiest sensationalism in the business. They have a long history of dwelling on the stories focusing on murdered beautiful white women with almost no significance to peoples’ day-to-day lives while more important stories get short changed.

Surely, all their good efforts evaporate when the master of self-promotion and editorializing while reporting, Geraldo Rivera is front and center. Rivera has a long history of putting himself in the center of dramatic news stories which seem more oriented to his subjective “how it feels to be there as only Geraldo can feel it” than solid, accurate reportage. Consider his distortions live from Afghanistan in the early days of that conflict.

For his usual Sunday night broadcast, Geraldo dedicated the entire hour to coverage of the Swine flu outbreak. While it is certainly serious and we deserve news coverage which helps us understand our exposure to this massive health risk, Geraldo does little to give us a clear sense of direction. With so many different figures interviewed for sound clips for the program, these are not the kinds of figures with whom the public has the advanced knowledge to weigh their reliability. The most disturbing revelation is that Janet Napolitano has been distracted from adding more possible conservative sources to her domestic terrorist list (did she leave out home schoolers?) to head the government’s efforts to respond to this threat.

Symptoms for Swine flu are typical of most annual flu outbreaks but could be more severe. It does respond to Tamiflu. Napolitano has reassured the public that it’s perfectly okay to eat pork. One cannot contract the virus from pork consumption. Let’s hope the Islamic community is not offended. We are urged to wash our hands frequently. Mayor Blumberg, from New York, was much more direct and assertive.

Any politician or media figure who exploits or politicizes this health issue must be held accountable for his or her actions. Now is the time for professionalism of the highest order, yet somehow we expect to hear Obama kingpins positing their could have done better if it weren’t for cuts or other actions of the Bush administration.