Instead of just interviewing tourists at the Washington Monument about their views on the pandemic, I really wish reporters would make the effort to interview immunocompromised, disabled, & higher risk people who can't even get medical care due to the lack of #COVID protections.
Focusing interviews on people who are in tourist spaces introduces a strong selection bias to stories. The people who are most impacted by this pandemic can't even safely access essential services like healthcare and public transport. They are being erased by poor media coverage.
Here's a great piece by
@kendrawrites on bias in #COVID reporting.
"Outlets have amplified voices that helped create a narrative that not only pathologizes those who remain cautious about the disease, but also fail to adequately convey the risks associated with Covid such that many people are unwittingly taking on potentially lifelong risks.
In the process, we’ve failed at our field’s core tenets — to hold power to account and to follow the evidence. "
@luckytran @kendrawrites
I noticed after Omicron was first identified in South Africa (Nov 2021,) the doctor noticed that her hospital was suddenly filled with children, whose SARS-COV2 cases were luckily relatively mild.
News outlets ignored the "children hospitalized" part, and rejoiced over the "mild" adjective.
A little more careful editing would have helped.
Story from November 2021
'Dr. Angelique Coetzee, a private practitioner and chair of South African Medical Association, told Reuters that on Nov. 18 she noticed seven patients at her clinic who had symptoms different from the dominant Delta variant, albeit "very mild".'
https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/safrican-doctor-says-patients-with-omicron-variant-have-very-mild-symptoms-2021-11-28/
@EugestShirley
just a bit of mild mass child hospitalization, yeah? No big