the hypnotic effect of numbers

THE HYPNOTIC EFFECT OF NUMBERS
2004-10-13


OCTOBER 13, 2004. These days, the CDC or the World Health Organization can report a new disease outbreak, and no matter how small the actual case numbers are, if the media package is wrapped in the proper tone of warning/hysteria backed up with scientific giggle-gaggle, everybody bows down and worries.

This is a major feat of PR.

The public has pretty much abandoned its own sense of what numbers mean.

Hell, most people have no idea how many people live in the US, any other nation, or the world.

Let us take three situations. SARS, so-called avian flu, and West Nile Disease.

First of all, as I have covered in past articles, there is no convincing proof that West Nile and SARS have ever been isolated as distinct viruses. So, right from the start, we're treading on very thin ice.

Anyway, since SARS was named, WHO stats show that 8096 human cases have occurred, worldwide, and there have been 774 deaths.

Since January 28, 2004, WHO reports 43 cases of human avian flu, and 31 deaths. Globally.

The CDC states there are no reliable estimates for West Nile Disease in humans, worldwide. In the US, since 1999, there have been 9122 reported cases of serious WN Disease, and 628 people have died.

I could add various limiting qualifiers to these stats (which would lower case numbers), but I'll forego that here.

Think about the stats, and try to put them in some sort of context.

People die all the time. Millions, for example, die of starvation.

100,000 people in the US alone die from the correct administration of FDA-approved medical drugs every year.

It is certain, in the SARS, WN, and avian flu situation, that some of the deaths have resulted from a combination of prior illness plus toxic medical drugs.

All in all, we are talking about a drop in the bucket, when it comes to death and West Nile, avian flu, and SARS.

Yet, people are looking over their shoulders for a virus with teeth and claws. And when they get sick, they accept whatever their doctors tell them.

I bring all this up, because I think that the recent John Keller revelations about VERY, VERY FEW PEOPLE DYING FROM FLU IN THE US EVERY YEAR are flying right into the radar of the public, which reflects: "Any number of deaths is frightening, no matter how few, as long as the CDC or WHO claims it's a threat to us all."

A million, 36,000, a thousand, seven hundred, four. It doesn't matter. People don't make distinctions.

What matters is the tone of the announcement and who is announcing it.

That, my friends, is called slavery, is called fascism. And although it may not be immediately apparent, the people who are wielding the spin are ultimately after political power.

There is one more factor to add in. The word is CONTAGION. The public has been conditioned up to its eyeballs to view POSSIBLE contagion as a dire threat, even when it doesn't pan out.

Even when, in the matter of so-called SARS in Hong Kong, it was discovered that a quarter of all the cases being reported centered on the Amoy Apartments complex, where feces were leaking through toilet pipes from apartment to apartment. Fecal-borne illness doesn't need people with samples under microscopes, doesn't need spinning centrifuges, in a hunt for viruses. That doesn't cure anyone. Plumbers cure people.

JON RAPPOPORT www.nomorefakenews.com

www.nomorefakenews.com

Tweet