It is astounding just how short is the collective public memory. The current hysteria being whipped up about swine flu is just the latest example.

In an unspoken Faustian pact between the pharmaceutical companies and the mass media, the short-term collective public memory is combined with those two tried-and-true human characteristics - fear and ignorance - to produce the mutually satisfying outcome of both pharmaceutical and media product sales.

Four or five years ago it was an "avian flu pandemic" that threatened humanity. (As most people's vocabulary did not include the word "avian", the mass media conveniently renamed it "bird flu", so everyone could be scared.) Unfortunately, the avian flu pandemic had the temerity to peter out without causing the levels of mass hysteria (and sales) desired by the diabolic-duo, leaving a relative handful of people dead in Third World countries, where attention to basic hygiene would have saved most of them.

And now we have the swine flu pandemic threatening global devastation once more, with the United States alone suffering….six people dead. The fact that 36,000 people per annum in the United States die from conventional influenza is not something that makes it onto the same page as the swine flu hysteria. Why? Because everyone knows about common influenza and there is no associated mass fear that can be exploited.

The media writers are, of course, well aware of these facts - but good news does not sell newspapers (or gain television audiences); they are motivated by that hack journalistic standard: "Never let the truth get in the way of a good story".

These facts are compounded by the global concentration of media ownership. Today's "news" comprises the publishing choices of newspaper editors and television programmers, supported by the journalistic content of writers well-schooled in the philosophical and commercial biases of their employers - that small cadre of commercial moguls who control the transnational business oligarchy.

David - it is difficult to take your article seriously. The media coverage of swine flu was near hysterical levels - out of all proportion to the risks involved. Only recently has it calmed down to something like a balanced coverage. But what was the point of it all?

It was nice that the flu outbreak was contained but all this really means is that we get ordinary flu this winter rather than an exotic flu. Have any lives been saved through the authorities running around in circles over this particular outbreak? As opposed to spending their energby on some other, far more deadly disease. Doubt it, but I'm open to a cost benefit analysis. Get busy!

While the swine flu has not the virulence of the 1918 outbreak, it is still more dangerous than normal flu, and considering that a normal flu outbreak dispatches nearly 2000 of our weaker citizens a year, I feel that the quarantine responses have been luke warm at best.

The contagious nature is similar to what we could expect of a more deadly outbreak, and while the threat is not as high, it will be a proving ground for the measures we have put in place.

For this reason alone, I would be happy with a "test run" on our threat response. If the flu breaks out and runs rampant before we have a vaccine, then we have failed miserably and need to start again.

If we stop it dead in its tracks, then we can sleep easier.

one needs to wonder why this beat up continues
no deaths recorded in australia,40 accorded to it worldwide
yet the numbers the press quotes are huge

last night yet another buzz piece[that again didnt mention that this virus was created in a lab]..nor that the vaxcine was announced the same day the outbreak was announced[see previous posts]

this non flue is a great destraction from real news[noting the chemical industry has been getting steady stock increases , benifitting the bankers..[who own the media,..itself going broke as it tries to sell us ever more fear

so far so good for who?