How bad can this swine flu be when the first person to be diagnosed with it in this country is then interviewed live on 5 Live Drive by Peter Allen? He sounded perfectly OK!
And I gather the couple who got it on their honeymoon have just been signed up by Max Clifford. Jesus wept. Doesn't that just about sum up our society?
32 comments:
Swine flu appears to be, ermmm, flu. And not (from the looks of things) a particularly severe form of flu. The BBC seems to be bigging it up somewhat, possibly because there is another disaster story that they would rather not cover.
It's only a matter of time before some mindless healthscare professional or other brands admirers of common sense 'swine flu deniers'.
It all has a curiously familiar ring about it. Can't quite place it...
I thought you were supposed to be a funny blogger Iain Dale. You know, right-wing blogs were supposed t be all full of fun and hilarity.
This is a bit po-faced for a Friday evening, no?
Iain, stop being a grumpy old man.
Don't you know this has been locked into the Downing Street Grid for months to help explain the shit results in the European elections ??
In fact they might have to be 'abandoned' and the current incumbents 'rolled over' for another 5 years. Or maybe 10.
Spectator has nicked my line.
We in a pandemic of panic!
Is Brown using Swine Flu to save his bacon?
I think things like this do show the problems with 24 hour news. I suspect that if we had to rely on newspapers the whole thing would feel a lot different.
Ian, your point is strong enough without the need to blaspheme.
Flu crisis? All the better to divert our attention from Brown bankrupting the country, 50% tax hike, smears, MPs' expenses, Brown's personal disasters this week (take your pick of which one).
Labour will looking to prolong this one as long as possible.
Not for much longer ....
( Even the grim reaper is wearing a face mask - on this weak Economist. Though he looks better than the Gordon Brown on last weeks cover )
WHO knows ? ;-)
signing up to Max Clifford because you have a wee bit of a cough.
Max I stubbed my toe this morning can you arrange a six figure newspaper deal for me.
Unbelievable the state of this country full of shallow self-obsessed narcissistic idiots.
"IN this country"? You mean England? The honeymoon couple from Polmont, central Scotland, were the first diagnosed sufferers in the UK and were signed up by Max Clifford on leaving hospital yesterday - and sold their story to the Daily Mail. They have been criticised for doing this by Tavish Scott, Scottish lib Dem leader.
The problem with a new strain of influenza is that risk assessment is difficult. Ben Goldacre (author of Bad Science) had a very good piece on this in the Guardian Comment is Free yesterday.
Sunny, you rather make my point for me, don't you.
Good strong post, Iain - but shaken by your language: such a phrase is offensive beyond description to Christian: I felt physical revulsion when I read it. It's the n*****r or p**f of our world - an expression inexcusable in any context, save when one is reading the Gospel of John aloud. Please don't do it again.
Tavish Scott has now attacked the couple from Polmont for having the temerity to sign up with Max Clifford? Sigh. This is the sort of thing that brings politicians into disrepute.
While few of us could ever aspire to the recruitment of Max Clifford, anyone who has ever been at the centre of a media firestorm typical of our 21st century 24/7 news era - or even seen one - cannot sensibly blame these people for wanting some support and management.
If your home is besieged wholesale by photographers, TV crews etc. - filming through windows, chapping on the door, posting in notes, telephoning mercilessly, photographingh any visitor - you have to do something to manage it, if only to stay sane; and I do not myself see any evident moral difference between hiring a professional for such 'crisis management' PR and having a literary agent - like the one the tedious Mr Scott will finally hunt down to sell his memoirs.
It would be good to see the return of elected representatives who do not feel obliged to express 'concern', 'disapproval', 'outrage', 'utterly unacceptable' etc. whenever some hack sticks a microphone under the chin!
This couple are not public people and what they choose to do is, I am afraid, none of Tavish Scott's business.
Well the first person to have got the *Swine* Flu has got a media deal. Maybe the first person who dies from it can be on your radio show?
All you need is one of those fishwives, who looks like an old Hag who has upside Goldfish bowl to communicate with the dead?
If you cannot get one of those just do a tape recording after breathing in some helium!
Andrew K is right. The BBC is going full steam with swine flu to cover up for the crumbling Labour government.
But just think what this means for Max Clifford. He will leave behind the world of celebrity whimsy, and be like one of those sad middle aged ambulance chasing lawyers from the films.
But with a new business in 'Ambulance Chasing PR'. In fact he could have his own little office in the Royal Marsden and with a pair of binoculars he signs up his victims, sorry "clients" before the competition bag them.
Slogan
"No cancer too serious.
No illness too mundane.
No condition too early.
F**k the rest.
Get ill wiv da best. "
I agree - that couple getting Clifford is a sad sign of our celebrity-infested culture. Shameful.
It sums up the country all right. Showing the free market is all well and good.
It started in Mexico.
It is a World-wide problem.
Global problems need Global solutions.
We are better placed than most other Countries..blah..blah..blah.
Isn't it all too depressingly familiar.
If it is really swine flu then Politicians feeding at the "trough of expenses" must be considered high risk for a severe dose.
This will make taxpayers weep. I work in the public sector (boo hiss). I actually do have a proper job and on nowhere near £30000 pa let alone £100000. Anyway, in my particular department there has sprung up in the last week, posters/billboards/postings on the intranet telling us to wash our hands, be hygenic, use hankies when sneezing etc etc. How much does all this cost to state the f*cking obvious?
It's about time that, when an MP was asked what they thought about swine flu, they responded "I really don't have anything to say about this, to be honest. There's more important things on my mind, like how much can I get away with on my expenses form."
Iain said
"And I gather the couple who got it on their honeymoon have just been signed up by Max Clifford. Jesus wept. Doesn't that just about sum up our society?"
No doubt you'll be telling us all about it on Skynews, Radio 5 and BBC Isles of Scilly at 11pm, 01:30 and Breakfast with Declan O'Booze on Radio Cotswolds tomorrow
I might not cancel that trip to Mexico after all. Have you got Max's number?
I don't particularly like Max Clifford but there was someone talking on Radio 4 about this during the day. He could not understand that the newspapers, media, "experts", reporters etc etc are all making lots of money out of the story so why shouldn't the couple at the centre of it also make something.
He also seemed to think that their story would only appear in the paper that buys the story when everyone knows the other papers will lift it from that paper.
They will have dozens (or even hundreds) of reporters all wanting to ask the same stupid questions.
The only bit about this "Epidemic" is the response suggested in the Mail
"There are fears people might have to avoid public events if the deadly outbreak continues to spread."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1174313/Another-school-closes-female-pupil-feared-swine-flu-holiday-Mexico.html
I hope it doesn't give the government ideas about banning public meetings, all on the grounds of "safety", just in case
Just out of interest, was swine flu created by an omnipotent deity or did it evolve?
This swine flu is a very apt illness ...... politicians, Max Clifford, snouts in the trough !
Do you think it's endemic in 10 Downing Street ?
What the hell have these people got to sell?
They went to Mexico on honeymoon. Came home with flu. Taken to hospital. Treated. Went home.
How much is that worth?
Anymouse at 1931. There is only 1 GOM and it's not Iain. Sunny. compared withmaunderings of the unending line of po-faced,PC humourless anoraks who infest your blogs even the Times obitury column is hilarious.
An editorial in the Daily Record yesterday called it (from memory, I don't have the paper and I can't find it on line "The Most Feared Disease on the Planet".
What swollocks.
Iain, if you haven't seen the 'Pooh and Piglet' take on this yet, find it. We need to find some humour in case it turns nastier. A very British vaccination, if you like.
My major gripe at the moment is the name; I wish they'd change it. I'm always on the brink of calling it swine fever.
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