In Mexico City, a second 'pandemic': rumors
In a survey this week of 410 Mexico City adults by the Mexican daily newspaper Reforma:
57% believed the government was underreporting the numbers
10% thought the statistics were being exaggerated
19% believed the official figures
14% were unsure of what to think.
With clear information hard to come by, rumors are flying. Years of opaque government and corruption scandals have made many Mexicans instinctively skeptical of most official data, but today's levels of mistrust are noteworthy even for Mexico.
Mr. Santoyo and many others hypothesize the virus was created and hyped by Mexico's government to distract the population from some bigger scandal being carried out. Others argue the official death toll is being purposely undercounted to prevent alarm from spreading, and fearful patients with mild symptoms are flooding hospitals and clinics.
Others are disregarding Health Ministry recommendations that they wear surgical masks, stay away from congested areas and wash their hands frequently...
"Other people think the opposite, and are going into a state of hysteria because they believe this thing is extremely serious and all or most of the sick patients are going to die," he adds.
Further complicating the cloudy picture is the information trickling from state governments, which sometimes appears to conflict with federal statistics and may be judged with different criteria.
Meanwhile, health officials have also been reluctant to release demographic and geographic information on where the outbreaks are occurring.
Full article: http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0430/p06s12-woam.html
In a survey this week of 410 Mexico City adults by the Mexican daily newspaper Reforma:
57% believed the government was underreporting the numbers
10% thought the statistics were being exaggerated
19% believed the official figures
14% were unsure of what to think.
With clear information hard to come by, rumors are flying. Years of opaque government and corruption scandals have made many Mexicans instinctively skeptical of most official data, but today's levels of mistrust are noteworthy even for Mexico.
Mr. Santoyo and many others hypothesize the virus was created and hyped by Mexico's government to distract the population from some bigger scandal being carried out. Others argue the official death toll is being purposely undercounted to prevent alarm from spreading, and fearful patients with mild symptoms are flooding hospitals and clinics.
Others are disregarding Health Ministry recommendations that they wear surgical masks, stay away from congested areas and wash their hands frequently...
"Other people think the opposite, and are going into a state of hysteria because they believe this thing is extremely serious and all or most of the sick patients are going to die," he adds.
Further complicating the cloudy picture is the information trickling from state governments, which sometimes appears to conflict with federal statistics and may be judged with different criteria.
Meanwhile, health officials have also been reluctant to release demographic and geographic information on where the outbreaks are occurring.
Full article: http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0430/p06s12-woam.html