No news is the ITV News
09/04/06 10:25 Media
issues
When is a story not a story? I'll tell you - it's
when ITV News leads in on a Saturday evening with
something about how 100,000 children might die if
there's a bird flu pandemic but the Government might
just be able to reduce that figure to 50,000.
These are horrifying figures until you dig a little deeper. As the news bulletin itself admitted, there has only been one case of bird flu diagnosed in the UK as yet and many of the signs are that it was an isolated incident. They didn't mention, although I'd suggest they should have, that even in the countries in which bird flu has become established there has been no pandemic.
The actual story was that the Government has been working through every possible scenario and the very, very worst is that could be a major problem with loss of infant life. It has therefore worked out how to reduce that loss, albeit leaving an appalling figure still doomed.
But this is what the Government should be doing at a time like this. It's highly unlikely that the worst-case stuff is going to happen. Massively so. Rather than panic, I find it reassuring that someone somewhere is working through just about every permutation of what might eventually take place and how best to increase my daughter's chances under any awful circumstances whatsoever.
Which, funnily enough, wasn't the rather tabloid tack taken by the ITV News.
These are horrifying figures until you dig a little deeper. As the news bulletin itself admitted, there has only been one case of bird flu diagnosed in the UK as yet and many of the signs are that it was an isolated incident. They didn't mention, although I'd suggest they should have, that even in the countries in which bird flu has become established there has been no pandemic.
The actual story was that the Government has been working through every possible scenario and the very, very worst is that could be a major problem with loss of infant life. It has therefore worked out how to reduce that loss, albeit leaving an appalling figure still doomed.
But this is what the Government should be doing at a time like this. It's highly unlikely that the worst-case stuff is going to happen. Massively so. Rather than panic, I find it reassuring that someone somewhere is working through just about every permutation of what might eventually take place and how best to increase my daughter's chances under any awful circumstances whatsoever.
Which, funnily enough, wasn't the rather tabloid tack taken by the ITV News.
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