EDITORIAL COMMENT: Silence only breeds fear (From South Wales Argus)
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EDITORIAL COMMENT: Silence only breeds fear
10:57am Thursday 30th April 2009 in News By South Wales Argus
WE are sometimes bewildered by the lack of flexibility of officials.
This country, indeed the whole world, may be in the early stages of an epidemic that will make past flu outbreaks seem relatively trivial.
Yet our attempts yesterday to clarify the situation regarding a Newport family who may or may not have contracted swine flu in Mexico were met with a brick wall by officials from the National Assembly who are co-ordinating the response in Wales.
The public health service for Wales has also refused to comment.
Let us state immediately that we have no wish to identify any potential victims of this disease unless they wish to be identified.
We hope their tests prove negative.
But we do have a duty to tell the public of Newport and greater Gwent what steps are being taken to deal with suspected cases.
If our information is incorrect then please tell us and we will not publish a story.
It is vital in this situation to avoid panic and misinformation, yet refusals by officials to help us inform the public of Newport about a suspected local outbreak are more likely to lead the public to worry unnecessarily.
We are grateful to Newport council for the limited help it was able to give us on this matter.
We have no reason to suppose that there is any danger to anyone, so why can't Assembly officials be more helpful?
Information on swine flu will be vital over the coming weeks, but a blanket silence to legitimate enquiries is not going to alleviate public concern.
Comments(8)
D.G.
says...
11:57am Thu 30 Apr 09
clare1984
says...
12:51pm Thu 30 Apr 09
We know as they said 27 People are being investegated in Wales.
We now know as the Assemmbly Officials have told us 9 so far do not have swine flu, tests awaited on 19 others.
Ok what more do we need to know????
They've told us all 27 are related to travel to the US or Mexico, and here's a bit of info for the Argus how do we not know that the Patients have said they dont want any information released that thus ties officials hands anyway.
D.G is right keep calm carry on and if the situation worsens i'm sure the Assembly, Government and anybody else will tells us what we need to know... blind panic would probably end up far worse than this flu!
stowhill
says...
1:01pm Thu 30 Apr 09
'If our information is incorrect then please tell us and we will not publish a story.'
Simply priceless! As for the content of the editorial...who cares with prose like this to savour! Give me more!!
Mervyn James
says...
4:14pm Thu 30 Apr 09
charles
says...
4:47pm Thu 30 Apr 09
An estimated 20 million people world wide died in the flu epedemic of the winter of 1918/19.
Katie T
says...
12:49pm Fri 1 May 09
Hmmm...on the other hand, there are the odd one, or two who are eventually easy to bend - but usually for a price, though.
THE CAMELEON
says...
12:01pm Sun 3 May 09
jilted john says...
11:55am Thu 30 Apr 09
At least we can take steps to avoid getting infected.
At the moment no one really cares because they think it’s not real.
It’s just something that happens to people on the TV.
If it’s to stop us panicking well let’s panic if your kids pick it up in school because those in charge decided not to tell, us were going to be well peed off .