Irresponsible Journalism Only Makes it More Difficult to Reach Herd Immunity

Jeffrey A. SingerIn the past few days I have come across two news headlines that only serve to fan the flames of fear, and work against physicians ’ efforts to persuade skeptical people to get vaccinated against COVID-19.The first example came on March 16, in a San Jose Mercury News headline blurting out: “3 Hawaii Residents Fully Vaccinated Against COVID19 Are Infected With The Coronavirus. ” The story referred to these three cases as “breakthrough” cases and noted that one of them was a fully ‐​vaccinated health care worker who had visited multiple cities on the U.S. mainland and tested positive on return to Oahu. The very last sentence of the news story stated:According to the state health department, the fully vaccinated people who tested positive did not become severely ill and none of them are known to have transmitted the virus.On March 18, I came across a similar story on theBay News 9 website serving the Tampa Bay region of Florida. The headline breathlessly stated: “Vaccinated Worker Tests Positive For COVID in ‘Breakthrough’ Case. ” It reported on a 27 ‐​year‐​old home health care nurse who was fully vaccinated with the Pfizer mRNA vaccine and tested positive on a routine COVID screening test she is required to take for work. A repeat test confirmed the screening test. It quoted the nurse as saying, “It still is shocking that I’m positive. I have no symptoms. ”The most important lines ...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs