ABC bird flu made-for-TV movie

[mtnmom]

I happened to see about 10 minutes of this trash tonight. What a bunch of sensationalist crap. It will be interesting to see the reaction(s) among the public, especially among lay people.

What really got me was that they were portraying the H5N1 almost as a hemorrhagic flu, at least in the few minutes I saw.

The media has such potential to educate and influence and instead all they wanted to do was to exploit the sensationalist nature of this potential public health problem to beef up ratings. I can see neurotic lay people (like my mother...LOL) getting really riled up by this type of programming.

Maybe I am judging unfairly because I only saw a few minutes, but I don't think so. Anyone else see any of it? any thoughts?

[HARRN2b]

This is an interesting link--no wonder the public is scared

http://www.pandemicflu.gov/general/greatpandemic.html#kentucky

[mtnmom]

I agree it was stupid to make the movie since it hasn't even happened yet BUT there is a disclaimer at the beginning of the movie saying it is FICTIONAL. Hello people, it's not real and they are not trying to portray it as real.

I am glad that there was a disclaimer at the beginning - I had hoped that there might have been. However, that does no good to people such as myself who caught a few minutes sometime after the beginning. I personally did not happen to need a disclaimer, as I can readily distinguish fact from fiction. However, I am pretty certain that a good portion of the American public cannot, at least on this subject.

There are better things to do in life than write complaint letters to ABC.

was that comment really necessary????? can think of several replies to this one but since I'm a bit hormonal today and overly sensitive, I will refrain. Therefore just go have a nice day. :)

[oramar]

I liked the movie though I seem to be the only one. It was mostly scientific but it was flawed in that it carried every single situation out to it's worse possible conclusion. Most likely the next pandemic won't be like that. I think it was the Discovery channel that carried a documdrama that mapped out the very same set of circumstances. From the patient ZERO that carries it from the far east, to the break down in public services and shortages of every possible kind. The Discovery Channel already did all this and did it better. Strangely enough there was no panic, no wide spread condemnation of the network. Why, because a lot more people watch prime time TV networks than educational networks. If only prime time TV would have done a show about what every weather science KNEW was going to happen to N.O. when it got a big hurricaine. Maybe everyone would not have been caught so flat footed and unprepared. By the way, the Discovery Channel and the History Channel have done shows about several other unavoidable pending disasters. Two of the biggest are another big earthquake and fire in southern California. It will be very similar to the one at the beginning of 20th century. Also a HUGE Tsunami will hit northern California all the way up into Canada when there is an earthquake right off the coast of that area. Last earthquake in that area was 300 years ago and caused 100 foot Tsunami in Japan. They are due for another one right now.

[ZASHAGALKA, RN]

I watched it on my DVR this morning. Come on, it was typical mindless 'made for TV' fare.

It was ok.

~faith,

Timothy.