In a Bad Year For the Flu, 50,000 Americans Die.

[MineralMan]

That is a tragic number, and is always mentioned after one of those years.

Currently, and within about one year, 546,000+ deaths have been recorded in the USA alone from COVID-19.

Why is this not at the top of the news on a daily basis? Why does the media not recognize the horrible scope of this pandemic?

Some are still denying the seriousness of this pandemic. Some are still refusing to get vaccinated. Some are still fighting efforts to get and keep the pandemic under control. Most of those are Republicans, part of the GQP.

It is beyond my comprehension.

[Wingus Dingus]

1. We have an anchor of crazy that's pulling us down, as a country.

[Unwind Your Mind]

2. Why does no one mention the fact that it's more than 1 percent of our population?

[BGBD]

3. Because

it isn't?????

[Unwind Your Mind]

5. No, you're right. I'm off by a decimal point

I did just look at the ratio of deaths to cases and the death rate is 1.82%

[fescuerescue]

8. That would be about 3.5 million dead

Right now we are at about 0.12%. (rough math)

[BGBD]

4. They do

I hear the total death count for the US multiple times a day just having CNN going in the background or on the radio while I drive.

It's reported constantly.

[Caliman73]

6. When all you see is the lie, you do not recognize it as a lie.

Right wing media has done a horribly excellent job at cutting people off from looking at the facts. They attack the notion of "truth". They spin facts and attack expertise. Their great success is convincing people that the consensus reality, is not consensus at all, that it is conspiracy. A conspiracy to keep them down, keep them from their rightful place at the top of this society.

When you are struggling and you feel that you haven't gotten enough, or that someone lesser than you has gotten more, then you are vulnerable to that kind of grievance media. You start to believe that the government, liberals, universities, etc... are all working against you, and that Fox New (owned by a billionaire and headlined by millionaires) is the voice of the "everyman".

Fox and other right wing outlets tilled the soil for years, and now when they plant the seeds of COVID-19 isn't that bad, the numbers are padded, the Democrats are "fearmongering", Trump did a great job and is not getting credit, and other nonsense; right wing minds are fertile ground.

Also, there is a cognitive bias that makes it easier to not react to 546,000 deaths. It is summed up in this paraphrased quote that I have heard many times but do not have the attribution for: "One death is tragic, 10,000 deaths is just statistics".

[fescuerescue]

7. It's at the top of all the news I watch.

Honestly the COVID story is probably been covered longer than any other story in my lifetime.

Pretty sure it beats even 9/11/01. By 9/11/02 the daily updates had stopped.

What other story gets daily reporting and updates on for over a year?


I think you would have to go back to the Vietnam war to find similar coverage.

[Celerity]

9. 559,930 and counting

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/