Zika Is Coming | Hacker News Reader

Zika Is Coming

nytimes.com

I take the top-level comments so far as an indication that -- if they aren't exactly afraid -- deep down inside, people are definitely feeling a certain amount of anxiety about the sudden rise of the Zika virus, and more the the point, what it really means about this new world we we're lurching into. A world which isn't coming to an end -- but slowly but surely, from one day to the next, it's a world which is changing, and generally for the worse. And in which ideas we might have taken for granted until now -- like "Hey, I could just move to Miami, and start a family, if I wanted" -- suddenly become quite complicated, indeed, and fraught with uncertainty.

And unfortunately, the only tool they know of to defend themselves with is snark.

it's a world which is changing, and generally for the worse

Ah, but this is objectively wrong, by almost every metric (crime, security, murder, health, longevity, happiness, poverty). What is getting worse is the general level of fear, and this comes from the fact that we can hear bad news faster and more generally than ever before, combined with our evolved nature to implicitly feel that everything that we hear about might personally affect us (see Dunbar's number), and clickbait tactics of news editors and the need to fill the 24 hour news cycle with sensationalism. Fear causes stress, and both fear and stress cause physically and socially damaging effects.

To wit: I never met anyone affected (directly or indirectly) by the recent Ebola outbreak in any social environment (online or offline) to which I belong, but almost everyone I spoke to about it was afraid of it. That's not to diminish the effect on the (globally) few people it impacts, which is horrible and terrifying, so the imbalance is not at all universal. However, it's a fair assumption that fear of Zika is considerably more dangerous to the average person (globally) than the risk of the virus itself. Multiply this across all the other things that people are afraid of but that are actually less dangerous now than at any time in our recorded past, and you end up with fear being the most damaging change for the worse.

Notice that the hot zone spans across jurisdictions that deliberately opted out of Medi-Cal, and generally opposed public health measures in general. Sad, because if Zika gets rolling there, the people who will most need access to health care will be the working poor.

Have they actually proved that Zika is even causing microcephaly?

It's either DDT or Ospreys. One comes with micro-cephalic children. The other dooms an endangered species to extinction.

Speak now, or forever hold your peace.

The world is rarely so conveniently simple as to present exactly two choices. I doubt this is an exception.

DDT is still used in the third world, and mosquitoes are evolving resistance to it. So choosing DDT will eventually end with extinct ospreys, and DDT-resistant mosquitoes.

This isn't news. It's fear-mongering.

If you are so worried, don't have a kid. The world is overpopulated enough as it is.

Am I the only who's noticed that there is always one and exactly one major disease of which we should all be mortally afraid?

I second this, it was HIV, then bird flu, swine flu, Ebola, now Zika.

Edit:

Actually the NYT article is quite nice in evaluating the risk and giving information about the danger zones.

But most probably all those viruses/microbes required public attention to get required funding to stop and confine them.

And global warming, right?

How is it that people who are sensible about energy policy suddenly turn into conspiracy theorists when it comes to public health policy? This guy isn't making any radical proposals. He's just suggesting a sensible mosquito abatement strategy in a particular part of the US where it makes sense.

>just suggesting a sensible mosquito abatement strategy

Sensibly suggesting it with the foreboding headline "Zika Is Coming"?

And, this, in the context of the fear that is already being ginned up about the virus.

I don't know that it's a conspiracy, but it's pretty predictable by now: "This New Virus Will Kill Us All" headlines. Story after story, then the fizzle when fears prove to be overstated.

So, just as suddenly, the headlines completely disappear. Ebola headlines stopped literally overnight from just about every media outlet.

But, within a few months another mortal fear arises. You can set your watch to it.

This guy isn't saying that Zika will kill us all. The headline you're complaining about simply states that Zika is coming. Are you claiming that Zika isn't coming?

Ebola didn't disappear on its own. It was sound containment policy that kept it from gaining a foothold in developed countries. Exactly the kind of sound policy that the author is advocating.

Your line of thinking is what makes measles come back.

I am not claiming that Zika is or is not coming. I am suggesting that the headline is loaded and that if you live in one of those dark orange areas on the map with the legend "The Most Vulnerable" it's probably scaring the shit out of you in a way that's disproportionate to the current threat.

>Ebola didn't disappear on its own

But it would have equally disappeared without the minor panic incited by the media. You remember that part too, don't you?

>Your line of thinking is what makes measles come back

Oh, the drama. I don't think my weariness of the fear mongering is going to bring back the Black Death. No, my ,"line of thinking" says let public health officials do their jobs without this incessant advertising-selling drumbeat regarding our collective impending doom.

But it's OK. Give me your address and I will bring my 8 unvaccinated kids and their unvaccinated goldfish to your house to hang out for a bit. Apologies in advance for your exploding head.

I don't remember any panic except from Fox News talking heads who assumed the executive branch would bungle containment. The author and the article are not in any way comparable to those fear mongers.

Ironically, there were literally headlines about "Ebola panic" itself.

Thankfully, Google is there when our memories falter.

Come on. HIV is still a major pandemic, but medical research has given us a dozen compounds against it. If caught early you can live 30 years while HIV-positive. Without medication it's still a death sentence. Try Botswana or Zimbabwe if you think AIDS isn't a problem.

And you should thank the physician who caught that Patrick Sawyer fellow in time. Ebola in Lagos would have been catastrophic.

Maybe the fear mongering for specific incoming threats in main stream media is a required part of fund raising. Then I could raise 2 critics:

1. The media-incited fear must be equally allocated to old, common as well as new threats

2. The tabloid type of fear mongering isn't needed.

Actually the NYT article is quite serious and informative, the headline which is similar to "winter coming" asks for preparations.

That's funny: serious and informative, yet soberly asking for preparations using a commonly known pop culture phrase that refers to an impending zombie apocalypse.

That's not my point.

Mark your calendar for a year from today. Two years at most. I all but guarantee you that Zika won't be in the headlines then, but another Scary Ass Microbe will be.

Yes. It is coronary heart disease.

Heart disease, also known as "not dying of anything else."

There's always been more than one.

I look at articles like these as raising awareness - not fear.

Because health agencies pour tons of work and money into preventing their spread before the next major disease can hit us.

Or would you rather a modern Spanish flu pandemic kill half a billion people?

>would you rather a modern Spanish flu pandemic kill half a billion people?

That's asinine. As if the choices are panicked fear or death. Do you think those public health agencies would be somehow less effective in the absence of fear-mongering?

My comment is not a question of there being public health threats. It's about the media coverage and the incessant need to sell fear in these times.

The author works in public health. Public health policy doesn't happen in a vacuum. Implementing the plan in the article requires public funds, and so it's perfectly reasonable to inform the public.

>Public health policy doesn't happen in a vacuum.

Yes, as any public health official will attest, public health policy happens best in a climate of unbridled fear and panic.

We're probably due for a good culling. There'll be eight billion of us before long.

Time to go play Plague, Inc, again...

It's OK. As long as we are all morbidly afraid, we will be immune.

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