AHCJ board member Ivan Oransky appeared on Brian Lehrer Live to discuss H1N1. The relevant segment starts at about 38:50 into the show.
Among the issues discussed:
- Why H1N1 is a “pandemic,” what that really means, and how the designation has affected the public perception of the outbreak.
- The effectiveness of the widespread adoption of hand sanitizers, especially in the context of flu and other viral outbreaks.
- Vaccination and the lessons/relevance of the 1976 swine flu “outbreak,” in which the vaccine turned out to be more dangerous than the actual flu.
- The level of immunity created by the first wave of H1N1 earlier this year.
- Media behavior during this outbreak, and the media’s responsibility to communicate as much information as possible without being “sensationalist.”
