On Sat, 2 May 2009 19:30:01 -0400 Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
writes:
>
> On May 2, 2009, at 7:25 PM, Eric Beck wrote:
>
> > Disclaimer: I appreciate and even like Mike Davis, but he
> > tremendously, often fatally, excitable.
>
> I admire Mike Davis a lot, but you're right about his penchant for
>
> excitement. A few years ago, it was bird flu that was going to kill
> us
> all. A few days ago, it was swine flu. It's always something.
> Reality
> can be awful enough - why get all worked up over stuff that turns
> out
> not to be true?
>
> Doug
> ___________________________________
>
It should be noted that Joaquin over at Marxmail points why we should take the more "optimistic" data that's now being reported from Mexico with a grain of salt.
Jim Farmelant
--------- Forwarded message ---------- From: "Joaquin Bustelo" <jbustelo at gmail.com> To: farmelantj at juno.com
The flu pandemic currently underway has produced the most startling data. Whereas the body count in Mexico had stood at 170 or more as of Tuesday, by Thursday night, after the President has ordered the whole country shut down for five days to try to slow the epidemic, authorities announced that the number of dead had dramatically increased by 50%, from 8 to 12.
WAIT A MINUTE, I hear you say. How can the number of fatal cases "increase" by 50% from around 170 --the last previous official figure-- to 12, the new one? Quite simply: most if not all of the 170 have been excluded from the new count.
How? By the simple expedient of not counting anyone who did not test positive for the virus in a DNA test.
These tests are not easy to do or cheap. They have to be done in a specialized laboratory and take more than 24 hours once you start them. Because what is involved in a technique to "amplify" a DNA "signal," even the tiniest contamination by ONE MOLECULE will ruin the test results (even if the tester doesn't realize it).
Until last week, Mexico did not have the capacity to do this test on anything like a clinical scale, and instead a few samples were sent to the CDC in Atlanta, as were all samples from throughout the United States. The aim of such testing is not to tally the total number of cases but rather the geographic spread of the disease. The number of cases instead is calculated by diagnosis, based on the symptoms and presentation of the illness as judged by a medical professional.
The CDC has now sent kits to state health departments and Mexico to enable them to do their own analysis. But everywhere the infection appears to be becoming firmly established, the testing quickly falls behind the rising number of cases. Many jurisdictions in the U.S. have announced they won't --in fact can't-- test every one of even the most suspicious cases.
When numbers are cited in news reports of the number of "confirmed" cases or "confirmed" dead, people need to keep in mind that the figure is COMMERCIAL and POLITICAL not *MEDICAL.* Health authorities are still keeping close track of the number of cases *diagnosed* by medical professionals. It is obvious that a decision to hide this figure from the public has been made by politicians all over. And as usual, me and my brother and sister hacks in newsrooms the world over are proving once again that not only are we a pack of whores, but a pack of INCOMPETENT whores.
Joaquin ____________________________________________________________ Click now for prescreened plumbing contractors. http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL2141/fc/BLSrjpTRHI80FEhzY7Q54tCvmXc9Z9s32RbOeOAzvL5SRCSZUlIcLt9TzUE/