This post is more or less in direct opposition to Bakhrom’s post on Swine Flu.  I agree with Michael Hancock here, but I’m going to go a little bit further and try to flesh out an argument.  This is not an attack on Bakhrom, whose work I respect.  However, I do not agree with the post that he published, and as I have the power to post my own opinions, I will do so.

Lack of information is the greatest threat to the human psyche.  The United States prides itself as being ahead of the game in the Information Age, with fast developing countries like China, India, and Brazil still considered by most Americans to be still in the dark ages of the pre-Internet Era.  There are many reasons for this, one of which is ignorance of modern scientific medicinal procedures and processes.  The reason I bring this up is that much the same is true in most of Central Asia and across the former Soviet Union.  I would have included Russia in the list above with China and Brazil, but I don’t consider it to be developing all that quickly at all.

Let’s take this apart in several steps.

Who gains from the fear?

There are real and imagined benefits to a frightened populace.  The easiest to quantify is the profit margin of affected pharmaceutical companies.  One doesn’t need to resort to conspiracy theories to point out the obvious.  In other words, I’m not about to suggest the Swine Flu was developed for profit or part of some secret plan of a powerful cabal of shadowy leaders.  I might suggest that it is a real disease, but one that is being utilized for maximum profit.  Pharmaceutical companies benefit when people who normally do not purchase pills, capsules, ointments, or other self-medications move in large numbers to buy a specific medicine.  In this case, I’m talking about oseltamivir, also known as Tamiflu.  Needless to say, in developing countries Tamiflu is reserved for the wealthy, which is where the local branches of those same drug companies go to work, often in competition with local drug companies working overtime to produce some kind of drug to promise the same effects.  Whether or not any of these drugs is effective, a placebo, or something in between I leave to the consumer.  The point is that people are generally buying drugs before they feel any symptoms, whether or not the drug is marketed as a preventative measure.

Another entity that benefits from mass fear is more abstract: government.  When people are afraid they are easier to control, and this simple truth is evident throughout history, political science, and the study of sociology.  Compare the level of local reaction to the Swine Flu Epidemic with any index of development.

Then consider Ukraine, where literally more than a million cases have been reported.  The World Health Organization itself printed the statistic is big letters - 1.3 million cases after only a week of full-scale epidemic.  How many deaths?  189 so far.  Do you have a calculator?  That’s a death rate of 0.00014538.  Did you also notice that the article I linked points out the invaluable political capital gained during epidemics?  It’s so easy to blame really complicated things like the economy, housing markets, and health care on elected officials - why not blame the flu epidemic on your opponent as well?

What causes the fear?

Numbers can really help cause fear, but fortunately they are also an excellent way to fight back.  So, millions have been infected, thousands have died.  No one can doubt that each death is tragic, and that each case that recovers safely is cause for mild celebration.  But how about a little perspective?  How many people die every day from swine flu?  If the numbers are to be believed, less than 10.  Consider how many people die of malaria daily, a disease infinitely more preventable than swine flu.  According to the WHO, there are roughly one million malaria deaths a year, making for an average of 2700 deaths Every Day.  That’s truly horrendous, but how many of this blog’s readers live in malaria-ridden countries?  Surely this kind of disease is the kind of specter that those living in sub-Saharan Africa and the tropics of South America must suffer through, tragic but unavoidable.  First off, I find the previous sentence too common an idea, and I find it deplorable.  Secondly, consider that the normal seasonal flu is almost as effective at killing weak humans, the young and elderly.  It is remarkably more effective at this sad task than the Swine Flu.  The WHO and the CDC (Center for Disease Control) in the United States claim that the seasonal flu kills roughly 36,000 people every year.  This is a very rough number, as statistics of this nature must be.  They suggest the real number fluctuates between 17,000 in good years to over 50,000 in bad years.

Mind over matter is the mantra of many a skeptic.  If you think you’re sick, then you’re probably sick.  Absence of the disease will not prevent you from developing symptoms identical to those you’ve heard about.  This can snowball into super diseases with symptoms that do not match any known diseases, wherein the afflicted people are all at the mercy of their own perceptions.  In cases like those, the only people with the power to cure are whomever the afflicted trust with medicinal power: holy persons, faith healers, бақсылар, exorcists, etc.  It’s not that difficult to imagine, especially when you concede that “fake” symptoms are just as real, and just as fatal, as actual diseases.  Mind over matter.

Instead of assuming the worst, let’s talk sensibly.  The Swine Flu is a disease, a form of influenza related to the flu most people catch every other year.  Take a real doctor’s advice and relax.  While the real flu is very likely to claim the lives of the young, weak, and infirm, which is a tragedy, the Swine Flu is much more likely to make them ill for three-to-four days, after which they will recover.  Part of the reason is the mildness of the symptoms.  Mildness, I said, as in the fever associated with Swine Flu is not fatal, the symptoms are more alike to the cold virus than the seasonal flu virus.

Conejo Valley Unified School District lead school nurse Susan Wilson hears a lot of fears from parents.

“There should be more concern than alarm,” she said.

Wilson understands parents’ concerns. During last week’s CDC news conference, Schuchat said the CDC is seeing more of the disease than was expected, and the flu season lasts until May.

“More than half of the hospitalizations are people under 25,” Schuchat said. “Ninety percent of the deaths are in people under 65. A flip-flop from what we see in seasonal flu.”

Sadly, some people are so devoted to the air of fear and conspiracy that even the nature of the numbers can be a source of fear.  One such journalist proudly claimed that the CDC’s numbers I quoted above were, in fact, just guesswork!  Only an estimate!  And then they went on to say:

As the CDC even says on their own website, “This estimate came from a 2003 study published in the Journal of the American Medication Association (JAMA), which looked at the 1990-91 through the 1998-99 flu seasons [10]. Statistical modeling was used to estimate how many flu-related deaths occurred among people whose underlying cause of death on their death certificate was listed as a respiratory or circulatory disease. During these years, the number of estimated deaths ranged from 17,000 to 52,000.”

Well, now, what do we make of this?  I would say this is a case of person willfully ignoring the facts of science.  SCIENCE, friends, never proves anything.  It merely disproves, leaving us with guesswork, estimates, and educated ideas.  Compare that with this woman’s article, which proves nothing, disproves nothing, and claims to give you solid answers: fear the swine flu, don’t trust doctors, and buy natural medicines.  Ahhh, that last part went right past you, yes?  This article is written in support of holistic “natural” medicines, which also stand to make a fair profit from fears of the Swine Flu epidemic.

To close this section, I’ll merely mention that my goal is not to scare you about the seasonal flu and malaria.  Read the CDC’s own website, and you’ll see it’s merely a scientific essay on the truth of seasonal flu.  It’s not out to scare you, just to inform.  You know what the flu is like, you’ve probably had it more than a couple times.  Is it something to be afraid of?  No.  It’s annoying, it gets in the way of work, it makes your life miserable… and then you get better.  A healthy person is rarely aware of his healthiness, while a sick person can think of nothing else but his sickness.

What will empower people?

Understanding the fear machine.  There is a very real reason that Americans have a less-known nickname for television - the “idiot box.”  It’s not just because the people that show up in the box are often idiots - it’s called that because it makes you into one, too.  In short, the fear of the Swine Flu is probably more damaging than the disease itself.  If you can, take this professor’s advice and take the chance to view how the various public officials and world leaders deal with this health crisis.

The current flu pandemic is clearly of great relevance with regards to health, but in passing it might also reveal something about our current relationship with governments, and the latter is not a trivial issue.

This isn’t the first Swine Flu epidemic to rock the United States, at least.  Back in the 1970s the government similarly over-reacted, and in the end it was decided their reaction killed more people than the flu itself.  To me, that’s life as usual on Planet Earth.  Ukraine is in rough shape right now, but really - how much of that is the fault of swine flu?  If you live in Russia, I think it’s safe to say that you are aware that you’re at much greater risk from going to the doctor than from getting sick.  I’m definitely concerned about how much larger the epidemic will become, both in reality and in perception.  Russia may be next to fall to the swine flu… so keep your heads about you, and don’t overreact!  Folk cures probably won’t hurt you, but if you get better, please don’t make the mistake of giving credit to grandmother’s advice, the onions you stuck up your nose, or the warm socks you stuck in your armpits.

Is the age of science dead already?  Probably.  But here’s a happy story for you, a good way for me to say goodbye, and good luck.