Sick of swine flu already?
Posted
Apr 28 2009, 12:26 PM
by
Minyanville
Rating:
Dear Macke:
There are thousands of people that die every year from flu. Most people think flu is an upset stomach. Real flu is lung- and fever-related.
The media screaming and yelling has gotten out of hand. In 1918, when there was a flu epidemic, there was no communication. A very big difference in knowledge.
I'm not saying there isn't a crisis. I'm just saying, s**t happens. I think this is unlike SARS; this is just stuff. Wash your hands - which your mom told you to do anyway.
You know what the Street is saying. I don't.
Please tell the kids to chill.
Lynn
Dear Lynn,
Let’s begin by defining our terms and putting them in context:
Pandemic: adj.
1. Widespread; general
2. Medical: Epidemic over a wide geographic area and affecting a large proportion of the population.
As of last night, there were 48 confirmed cases of swine flu in the US, and, according to recent data, as many as 200 deaths worldwide. For perspective, 36.5 million people live in California, over 10% of the US population of 310 million, give or take. The fatality numbers will certainly rise. That said, unless they increase 500,000 fold, give or take, they'll still fall short of the “large proportion” definition standard, but be in the neighborhood of a “pandemic” for the purposes of hyperbole. Last year, classified as a “mild” one by numerical standards, 39,000 men, women and children died from various strains of the flu.
What, you may ask, does a genuine and deadly pandemic look like? Horrible. Specifically, a pandemic looks like the 1918 flu outbreak. That pandemic killed a minimum of 30 million worldwide, and 550,000 Americans near equivalent to the fatalities incurred in the Civil War. I'd encourage those looking for more information regarding the 1918 epidemic to see the map at pbs.org. In September and October of 1918, roughly 1 of every 20 Americans died from the flu. At the moment, only slightly more than 1 in 1,000,000 Americans have been diagnosed as sick in the current outbreak. In New Jersey -- the most densely populated state in the nation -- 5 “probable” cases have been identified to date, none requiring hospitalization.
Given the glaring differences between the current relatively benign, albeit geographically widespread, flu strain and the terrifying plague of 1918, a rational person (defined as “one not working in the media”) may think a voice of calm dissension would be accepted, if not welcomed.
Allow me to offer my personal experience in regards to an effort at being a voice of statistical reason. On last night’s Fast Money, I made an effort to dispense with the hype and ask our guest Joseph Greff, JPMorgan’s (JPM) Gaming, Lodging and Cruise analyst, whether there was evidence of a recovery in the companies he studies, prior to the outbreak over the weekend. The 2 events that followed, in order, were these: Mr. Greff offered that, at best, there had been a slowing in the rate of decline in broad rates of travel in the companies he follows. Next, Melissa Lee offered a very professional and gracious apology for my apparent lack of sensitivity to those 250 potential victims and their families. Thus far we’ve had an official presidential statement (“there is reason for concern and for a heightened state of alert but no cause for alarm”). While the New York Times said this statement “hit the right note,” I'd hasten to observe that those feeling “angst,” “anxiety,” “irritability," “psychosomatic symptoms" or “apathy” were ignored by President Obama. Thus, those enduring the latter symptoms have no way of gauging whether or not the President believes their emotions to be rational, in the manner of, say, doing a fly-by of downtown Manhattan with Air Force One, or evidence of giving into irresponsible panic.
Perhaps this utterly overblown quasi-outbreak of the flu will morph into an internationally horrifying apocalypse-level plague as we saw in 1918. I, for one, will go ahead and wait for a great deal more evidence prior to battening down the hatches and soaking the kids in 200-degree bleach a few times a day. Some actual mortality at a level greater than the normal rate of flu deaths, for instance, might raise my level of President Obama-approved heightened alert.
Until I get that evidence, from where I’m sitting (comfortable at the moment, but with a 3 and a 6-year-old, sick with something resembling the flu 3 or 4 times every winter), this is 99.9% media hype. Thus, I’m having one heck of a hard time being sympathetic when countless subjectively worse, objectively more likely but numbingly “normal” threats, to my life surround me and my family on a daily basis.
I have a friend who underwent chemotherapy for the third time since I’ve known him this month. He’s been technically dead several times and lives with the knowledge that tomorrow is promised to neither him nor anyone else. For him, I feel sympathy, admiration and gratitude for his friendship.
Swine flu? I feel something resembling, but not quite, sorry for folks buying surgical masks under the impression that dressing like Michael Jackson and his children will decrease their level of risk. Flu is caused by a virus, generally far too small to be stopped by relatively porous drug-store masks. I pity the hotels and airlines and other businesses who have seen their nascent recoveries snuffed by the media clubbing this story like an innocent pig. I feel bad for those shutting themselves into their houses in an effort to protect themselves from a threat that, to date, seems roughly as genuine as Orson Welles’ aliens in New Jersey.
Speaking solely for this particular member of the media, a 102-degree fever sounds comparatively soothing if it kept me from having to look America in the eye and feign sympathy for the 48 Americans who have thus far been confirmed to be afflicted with this particular flu, as compared to the 36,000 Americans who die from other forms of the flu every year.
Top Stocks blogging partner Todd Harrison is founder
& CEO of Minyanville.com. This post was written by Minyanville Contributor Jeff Macke.
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