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>technical name In an era where almost all viruses/diseases have been referred to by non-technical names, the rapid switch to a technical mouthful of “COVID-19

>technical name In an era where almost all viruses/diseases have been referred to by non-technical names, the rapid switch to a technical mouthful of “COVID-19” or “SARS CoV 2” is absolutely political. I remember sitting at an airport last year watching newscasters denigrating the use of the term “Wuhan virus” as I had just walked past a sign warning about MERS (Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome) just on the other side of security. It felt other-worldly. Then, after the CCP PR campaign of using the technical term had fully caught on, all of same news stations called the original variants the “UK/Kent variant” and the “Indian variant” for weeks/months until they caught themselves and switched to the Greek alphabet. And like programming with too much abstraction and bad variable names, the new Greek alphabet names for the variants actually obscure useful information — you no longer know where the hotbed locations are for each variant, and you have go looking online for their origins, instead of just having that info in the name. West Nile, Guinea Worm, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Lyme disease, Ross River fever, Omsk Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola, MERS, Marburg Virus, Spanish Flu, Lassa Fever, Legionnaires Disease. All without fanfare or protest. Wuhan virus? Oh, no no no. That would look bad for the party. Can’t have that.

bellyfullofbac 5y ago
Geez, how hard is it to just call it Covid rather than moan about it? What next, do you want to complain about having to call the HIV-caused disease AIDS, do you prefer "gay cancer"? "Gay plague"? As to where the hotbed for Delta variant is: nowadays, everywhere!
- joophro 5y ago
  Nobody is “moaning”. We are pointing out obvious inconsistency. What’s ironic about THIS particular virus is that if any virus DESERVES a regional origin name, it’s this one, as this one was most likely created in a lab and released on the world due to lab failures. Perhaps I could entertain the notion forgoing regional naming for viruses of natural origin, so as to not unduly destroy tourism, travel, and reputation of areas that just got unlucky. In this case, though, name and shame is more than fair — it’s deserved. And consistent!
bjowen 5y ago
You forgot Irish disease, French disease, German disease, Italian disease [0]. Why do you think the toponym of the point of discovery of a virus or strain is relevant? At this point, it has been circulating on multiple continents for 18 months, your most likely source of infection is in your neighbourhood, not another country or person whose ancestry you believe to be associated with that place. Systematic names have been increasingly common for influenza strains for a decade now, and if anything the systematic name SARS-2 gives you more useful information about the virus. To the extent that the choice not to call it something arbitrary [1] like Spanish flu is political, it is to protect people from ostracism and hatecrimes, which is an actual problem that happens in such circumstances and has since December 2019 [0,2]. If we were making name choices for inherently-parseable utility, we’d be calling every respiratory virus Coverface Washhands Stayhome. [0] https://jmss.vic.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/The-Racism-Pandemic.pdf https://jmss.vic.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/The-Racis... [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2805838/#!po=1.72414 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2805838/#!po=1.... [2] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs12103-020-09545-1 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs12103-020-09545...

bellyfullofbac 5y ago

Geez, how hard is it to just call it Covid rather than moan about it? What next, do you want to complain about having to call the HIV-caused disease AIDS, do you prefer "gay cancer"? "Gay plague"? As to where the hotbed for Delta variant is: nowadays, everywhere!

joophro 5y ago
Nobody is “moaning”. We are pointing out obvious inconsistency. What’s ironic about THIS particular virus is that if any virus DESERVES a regional origin name, it’s this one, as this one was most likely created in a lab and released on the world due to lab failures. Perhaps I could entertain the notion forgoing regional naming for viruses of natural origin, so as to not unduly destroy tourism, travel, and reputation of areas that just got unlucky. In this case, though, name and shame is more than fair — it’s deserved. And consistent!

bjowen 5y ago

You forgot Irish disease, French disease, German disease, Italian disease [0]. Why do you think the toponym of the point of discovery of a virus or strain is relevant? At this point, it has been circulating on multiple continents for 18 months, your most likely source of infection is in your neighbourhood, not another country or person whose ancestry you believe to be associated with that place. Systematic names have been increasingly common for influenza strains for a decade now, and if anything the systematic name SARS-2 gives you more useful information about the virus. To the extent that the choice not to call it something arbitrary [1] like Spanish flu is political, it is to protect people from ostracism and hatecrimes, which is an actual problem that happens in such circumstances and has since December 2019 [0,2]. If we were making name choices for inherently-parseable utility, we’d be calling every respiratory virus Coverface Washhands Stayhome. [0] https://jmss.vic.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/The-Racism-Pandemic.pdf https://jmss.vic.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/The-Racis... [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2805838/#!po=1.72414 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2805838/#!po=1.... [2] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs12103-020-09545-1 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs12103-020-09545...