Flu Fighters Not Content with Calm

Aug. 25, 2009— -- Why are health agencies peddling more and increasingly specific advice on flu preparedness, when the public is feeling pretty chill about it?

The latest Washington Post-ABC News poll shows the American public is not very worried about flu. Most people feel confident that health agencies will be able to handle a flu outbreak. But health officials don't seem content with that sort of tranquility.

Perhaps these officials are more clever and more subtle than we give them credit for. Maybe they know that if they keep escalating the barrage of flu "guidance," if the tabloids run a scary flu headline every few days and the airwaves are alive with tweets on flu, many people will dismiss it all as overblown advertisement about a mild threat -- and therefore stay calm.

But calm isn't what officials are after. "No need to panic" is so '80s.

Now, officials' aim is to fight what they claim is public complacency. We're not fearful enough. And, behind that, their goal is to keep the taps open on the flow of dollars to their own agency or project.

That's why last week you heard the World Health Organization warning government to be ready for what it calls an "explosion" of new flu cases. And why, here in the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention gave recommendations to businesses about planning for employee absenteeism.

It's why it isn't enough for the CDC to offer straightforward contagion-control advice, like telling people with influenza-like illnesses to stay away from others for at least 24 hours after fever subsides. They also offer guidance to schools and colleges, including last week's suggestions about using shirt sleeves to cover sneezes and wearing masks to kiss -- reaching, it seems, new heights of irrelevancy. But these efforts are important to the organizations' crusade to keep the fear alive.

Each health agency feels it must make an announcement about flu at least twice a week. Does that mean something new has happened with flu? Not so far: H1N1 flu has been consistently mild since the outbreak began, in April.