Blatham, ehBeth, Canajuns!! What do you make of WHO...?

I live in Toronto. I'm not particularly worried.
Though I do admit, I'd not encourage hamburger and mrs. hamburger to visit right now. They're a bit more in the population of concern.

As for WHO, in the words of a fine Canadian band, the Dayglo Abortions, 'Argh! F--k! Kill!' Finally Mayor Mel steps up to the plate in our defense, and bless him for that. I have had several e-mails from concerned U.S. friends of mine as all they see on TV are people in Toronto wearing masks and going in and out of hospitals. Do you know I have yet to see a mask, and I am on public transit pretty much every day? The hype is not doing anyone's business here any good, and I feel the media are being irresponsible. As regards WHO, I suppose they are just doing their job, but I am irked. Incidentally, our mortality numbers are also down, but so far, it seems only the local media has picked that up.

Yeah. It kind of reminds me of when my corner of New Mexico had a flare up of a new variety of hanta virus. Without some detailed reporting, no one would have noticed. It was a bad year for the tourist traffic.

The WHO just haven't been the same since John Entwhistle succumbed to SARS

Tim Horton's hears a WHO?

If I don't laugh, I'll probably yell...

just heard the weirdest thing on the CBC. More people die of malaria every day than have died of SARS in total. I'm going to try to source that.

What could have been WHO's motive for the Toronto statement?

Can they be held liable, if it is discovered they had no real reason to make such a damaging statement?

Here are the straight facts: SARS has been mostly concentrated in York region and the outskirts of the city. About 5 million people populate this area, including Toronto. 300 people have been officially quarantined for full-blown SARS. Of that, less than 5% have actually died, and 85% of those who did were seniors. The last recorded death from SARS was a man who was 99 years old.

Malaria and influenzia are major killers, Beth. Last I heard though, tuberculosis was still the worldwide leader. It is odd that we hear so little about them.

From the BBC:

hmmmmmm
i don't have my calculator, but i'm pretty sure 275 x 7 does not equal 4,649

there was a discussion on CBC radio this morning. One of the british reporters suggested that this focus on SARS, and it's heavy reporting in the U.S. in particular, was an effort to distract people from what is currently happening in Iraq and ongoing difficulties with the U.S. economy. I find that hard to believe. On the other hand, one of my co-workers came back from a business trip from Kansas on Thursday and was totally flipping about the U.S. coverage about SARS in Canada and the almost total lack of coverage in re Baghdad - maybe the Brit was onto something?

SARS: 'Some Acceptance of Reality Someday?'

4,649 divided by 275 is 16.905454..., so that's one in 17.

I don't think there is necessarily any nefarious planning behind SARS reportage -- a smoke filled room with shadowy figures saying "See, if we play up this little disease, people will stop thinking about Iraq" -- but I do think this is the same brand of journalism that reported the "stranger danger crisis." I.e., there were not actually that many more kidnappings than usual (last summer?), but it certainly seemed that way from the reportage.

They want to sell papers, and people are worried about SARS.

I am. Firmly in the category of I know I shouldn't be, but tough. A 2-year-old boy in Minnesota may have it, my mom works in a hospital, and she wants to come visit. Likely? No. But I think about these things.

soz - things we can't control can be scary - but only if we let them. Life just isn't controllable - cr@p happens - we all need to accept that and live our lives. mrs. hamburger was telling me that a lot of their friends were really upset that they had continued with their travel plans regardless of the fact that the attack on Iraq might (and in fact, did) start on the day they were scheduled to fly to Germany. Giving up on their plans would have been giving up/folding/letting the 'bad guys' win. Not the life lesson I learned from hamburger and mrs. hamburger.

Courage, my love. Courage.



(co-incidentally the name of one of my favourite shops in tranna)

soz - i do really wonder why there is so much more reporting about SARS in the U.S. than here. It seems quite odd. Watching U.S. news coverage of what's going on in Toronto is almost funny, it's so unreal.

I've got a much better understanding of one of my friend's almost gleeful laughter about the reporting of the situation in Israel a few years ago. The media can, and does, twist things til they are virtually unrecognizable.

one of the problems with sars is the "unknown' factor. scientists haven't been able to fully identify the virus; so speculation runs wild. remember when aids first appeared? i remember watching a report at that time that suggested a lot of restaurant food would be contaminated with the aids virus...... i would have to say that we did not do a particularly good job in canada to tackle the sars problem and camly explaining/reassuring... as my old boss used to say: it's not good enough to do the job well YOU MUST MAKE SURE THAT OTHER PEOPLE BELIEVE YOU DID THE JOB WELL ! and ranting and raving a la mel lastman just won't convince people. to add a little personal experience : we came back from germany via toronto airport to kingston; at the customs and immigration checkpoint was a cardboard box with some xerox-copies of sars info - take one, if you want one! there was no one from ANY health department in attendance - the customs officers just wanted to know how much liquor and cigs we brought back! as some passenger said, there was a more thourough inspection - including having to walk over disinfecting mats - when the mouth-and-foot disease hit great britain some time ago..... go figure! hbg

Interesting.

hamburger, yeah, the unknown danger is more unsettling than the known. Even when you know the known is a greater danger. If you follow...

ehBeth, the media are twisting things beyond recognition all the time, to be sure. (I never exactly took things at face value, but when I had a few articles written about me I realized just how much filter there is.)

And then there is Dr. Horowitz...

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/040603_sars_scam.html

The latest news: http://apnews.myway.com//article/20030429/D7QNBFIG0.html

re the unknown danger:

in Germany 40,000 people died in 2002 because of alcohol and alcohol related .... :wink: