4 ms·

Even without seeing headlines like this, I have felt for a while that Zika is being downplayed in the media. I remember mass hysteria over mad cow disease, bird

Even without seeing headlines like this, I have felt for a while that Zika is being downplayed in the media. I remember mass hysteria over mad cow disease, bird flu, and ebola. Zika seems at least on par with these to me. This disease is so new that we really don't know how long women have to wait before they can get pregnant safely-- if ever. We know that it stays latent in semen for a long time after being infected. Certainly it sounds very scary. But for the most part it's being reported by the media in a very calm manner and I see relatively no panic. And that's not to say that mass panic is the right response to Zika, but just that our global reaction to Zika seems wildly inconsistent with our super-diseases of yesteryears. When the ebola crisis was going on across the Atlantic ocean, I saw many normal (albeit misguided) people in my Midwestern supermarket stockpiling bottled water and dry goods. Meanwhile with Zika, they're estimating that 25% of Puerto Rico will have the disease before 2017. And yet I don't feel any real sense of panic in this country. What gives? Is society just collectively becoming more reasonable? I find that hard to believe.

tim333 10y ago
I guess as Wikipedia has it the infection "often causes no or only mild symptoms." Even so it's not something you want. Personally I think they should crack on with the Oxitec GM mozzies which on balance of probabilities should cause far less problems than the disease. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/aug/14/florida-keys-zika-virus-genetically-modified-mosquitoes https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/aug/14/florida-keys...
- maxerickson 10y ago
  As a point of comparison, polio is similar, the great majority of cases produce no symptoms or only minor symptoms.
elif 10y ago
It's not exactly new ( first studied in 1947 https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/zika-statement/ https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/zika-statement/ ), and basically spreads as quickly as any other STD ( the mosquitos that carry it typically travel no more than 400 meters http://www.who.int/denguecontrol/mosquito/en/ http://www.who.int/denguecontrol/mosquito/en/ ).
- nickysielicki 10y ago
  Be that as it may, global panic relating to HIV/AIDS, Ebola, Mad Cow Disease, Bird Flu, etc. was not primarily based in scientific reason. Consider Princess Diana shaking hands with an AIDS patient in 1991 and how big of a deal that was. I'll admit that I don't know much about Zika outside of the few articles I've read. And I'll also admit that I'm pretty afraid from what I've read. But what I find most interesting about Zika is this sociological aspect where the soccer fans in Brazil are chanting "Ziiikaaaa" on goal kicks and it seems like we've kind of just accepted that this is going to happen. Thousands of babies have been born with abnormalities already. I'd expect more panic.
  - maxerickson 10y ago
    It's winter in Brazil. There aren't a lot of mosquitoes right now. A US athlete acted like a ponce over Zika. The crowds chanted Zika to make fun of her. When I say ponce I'm talking about posting the pictures here: https://www.buzzfeed.com/bradesposito/heres-why-hope-solos-being-trolled-with-zika-virus-chants https://www.buzzfeed.com/bradesposito/heres-why-hope-solos-b... I'm not talking about thinking it over carefully.
    - steve19 10y ago
      Do you know what "ponce" means? It means an effeminate man. So a woman who might be wanting to start a family has the audacity to bring insect repellent with her to Brazil, and she deserves to be harassed by thousands of soccer fans (and mocked by a HN user)?
      - maxerickson 10y ago
        It may be a poor word choice. I meant it to mean "ridiculous person". I would say that "bring insect repellent...to Brazil" is a very friendly way of characterizing the photos in my link.
percentcer 10y ago
I'm guessing it's along the lines of "Zika seems to only affect pregnant women, I'm either A) not a woman or B) not planning on getting pregnant any time soon, this will all be over by then."
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  Zika has a number of neurological and other impacts on adults, as well as its impact on fetuses.
  - jonknee 10y ago
    > Zika has a number of neurological and other impacts on adults, as well as its impact on fetuses. The effect on adults is not yet fully known (hence the OP!). This was just the first study on the topic.
steve19 10y ago
The Olympics. 1. The journalists really want to travel to Rio to report on the games, so they evaluate the risks rationally and suddenly the risk does not seem so great, none of them ever plan on traveling to rural West Africa. 2. News organizations don't want the Olympics cancelled. Olympics == page views.
ionlysaididid 10y ago
It's probably a mix of a) society becoming more stupid b) the media not being able to hype something that doesn't kill at rates similar to bird flu or ebola c) the media not having as close a connection with the victims as media darling diseases like HIV. This is something that can cause severe retardation in children at somewhere on the order of 5-10x more than Downs Syndrome where mothers are infected- and that's comparing to rates for Western countries with women having children at the extreme outer edge of the healthy childbearing age. Bird flu is bad, but when it kills, it's a rapid death, and the places where it has occurred don't have particular problems with population replcement. Zika, on the other hand, can mean that the mother's life and a fair amount of government and NGO money is going to be tied up caring for the affected baby. Not as bad an impact as HIV has had in the third world (outside of Cuba), but it still needs stopping before the problem grows.

tim333 10y ago

I guess as Wikipedia has it the infection "often causes no or only mild symptoms." Even so it's not something you want. Personally I think they should crack on with the Oxitec GM mozzies which on balance of probabilities should cause far less problems than the disease. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/aug/14/florida-keys-zika-virus-genetically-modified-mosquitoes https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/aug/14/florida-keys...

maxerickson 10y ago
As a point of comparison, polio is similar, the great majority of cases produce no symptoms or only minor symptoms.

elif 10y ago

It's not exactly new ( first studied in 1947 https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/zika-statement/ https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/zika-statement/ ), and basically spreads as quickly as any other STD ( the mosquitos that carry it typically travel no more than 400 meters http://www.who.int/denguecontrol/mosquito/en/ http://www.who.int/denguecontrol/mosquito/en/ ).

nickysielicki 10y ago
Be that as it may, global panic relating to HIV/AIDS, Ebola, Mad Cow Disease, Bird Flu, etc. was not primarily based in scientific reason. Consider Princess Diana shaking hands with an AIDS patient in 1991 and how big of a deal that was. I'll admit that I don't know much about Zika outside of the few articles I've read. And I'll also admit that I'm pretty afraid from what I've read. But what I find most interesting about Zika is this sociological aspect where the soccer fans in Brazil are chanting "Ziiikaaaa" on goal kicks and it seems like we've kind of just accepted that this is going to happen. Thousands of babies have been born with abnormalities already. I'd expect more panic.
- maxerickson 10y ago
  It's winter in Brazil. There aren't a lot of mosquitoes right now. A US athlete acted like a ponce over Zika. The crowds chanted Zika to make fun of her. When I say ponce I'm talking about posting the pictures here: https://www.buzzfeed.com/bradesposito/heres-why-hope-solos-being-trolled-with-zika-virus-chants https://www.buzzfeed.com/bradesposito/heres-why-hope-solos-b... I'm not talking about thinking it over carefully.
  - steve19 10y ago
    Do you know what "ponce" means? It means an effeminate man. So a woman who might be wanting to start a family has the audacity to bring insect repellent with her to Brazil, and she deserves to be harassed by thousands of soccer fans (and mocked by a HN user)?
    - maxerickson 10y ago
      It may be a poor word choice. I meant it to mean "ridiculous person". I would say that "bring insect repellent...to Brazil" is a very friendly way of characterizing the photos in my link.

percentcer 10y ago

I'm guessing it's along the lines of "Zika seems to only affect pregnant women, I'm either A) not a woman or B) not planning on getting pregnant any time soon, this will all be over by then."

dragonwriter 10y ago
Zika has a number of neurological and other impacts on adults, as well as its impact on fetuses.
- jonknee 10y ago
  > Zika has a number of neurological and other impacts on adults, as well as its impact on fetuses. The effect on adults is not yet fully known (hence the OP!). This was just the first study on the topic.

steve19 10y ago

The Olympics. 1. The journalists really want to travel to Rio to report on the games, so they evaluate the risks rationally and suddenly the risk does not seem so great, none of them ever plan on traveling to rural West Africa. 2. News organizations don't want the Olympics cancelled. Olympics == page views.

ionlysaididid 10y ago

It's probably a mix of a) society becoming more stupid b) the media not being able to hype something that doesn't kill at rates similar to bird flu or ebola c) the media not having as close a connection with the victims as media darling diseases like HIV. This is something that can cause severe retardation in children at somewhere on the order of 5-10x more than Downs Syndrome where mothers are infected- and that's comparing to rates for Western countries with women having children at the extreme outer edge of the healthy childbearing age. Bird flu is bad, but when it kills, it's a rapid death, and the places where it has occurred don't have particular problems with population replcement. Zika, on the other hand, can mean that the mother's life and a fair amount of government and NGO money is going to be tied up caring for the affected baby. Not as bad an impact as HIV has had in the third world (outside of Cuba), but it still needs stopping before the problem grows.