CBS Covers Antibiotic Overuse In Farming

 

 

# 4339

 

 

Last night Katie Couric of the CBS Evening News began a 2-part look at the use of antibiotics on factory farms, and the risks of creating and spreading resistant strains of bacteria.  

 

Part 2 airs tonight.

 

But if you missed it, the 7-minute segment is available online.

 

Maryn McKenna, whose book Superbug is due out the end of next month, has been following this story for years of course.  Her Superbug blog is a tremendous repository of information on MRSA, and the dangers of antibiotic overuse.

 

Maryn has written two blogs in the past couple of days on factory farming, MRSA, and the CBS report.

 

CBS antibiotics and farming package, day one

Farming and antibiotics - and voices from the ag side

 

A trip through the Superbug Blog archives will turn up dozens of other posts on this topic.

 

Highly recommended.

60 Minutes Does H1N1 Flu

 

# 3848

 

 

One of the advantages that the Television news media has over blogs and other printed formats, is their ability – through video tape – to take us intimately into the lives of people affected by this pandemic.

 

Their ability to `humanize’ the story. 

 

Last night the venerable American TV newsmagazine show 60 Minutes, which has run on CBS for more than 40 years, ran a piece on the spreading H1N1 virus – and did so by interweaving the story of 15-year-old Adam Duvall though the narrative.

 

But this is more than a human interest story.  It also has interviews with Admiral Anne Schuchat of the CDC, Dr. Peter Palese of Mount Sinai Medical Center,  and the CDC’s top pathologist Dr. Sherif Zaki.

 

 

The story (essentially the transcript), and a link to the video below.

 

 

 

 

Oct 19, 2009 6:50 am US/Eastern

H1N1 Most Dangerous To Young People

'60 Minutes' Reports Swine Flu Spreading Fast Early In Season

By SCOTT PELLEY, 60 Minutes Correspondent told
NEW YORK (CBS News) ― If you're confused about the 2009 H1N1 "swine flu" virus, no wonder. There's a lot of conflicting information. The Centers for Disease Control tells us that the way this virus is spreading is unprecedented.

 

The CDC opened its doors to give 60 Minutes and correspondent Scott Pelley a look at the extraordinary federal response. It turns out, in many respects, that the 2009 H1N1 virus is no worse than the everyday flu.

 

While 99 percent of the people who get it suffer just a few miserable days at home, it is also true that for something less than one percent, H1N1 can be fatal. And many of them are the last people you'd expect to see rushing to an emergency room.

 

On Oct. 7, 15-year-old Luke Duvall landed at Arkansas Children's Hospital in Little Rock. His life was slipping away. Luke was on a ventilator, not breathing on his own.

 

Dr. Michele Moss suspected H1N1. She had already lost one patient to the virus. "He's extremely fragile right now. His blood pressure is very tenuous and could go down at any second. So he's a very, very sick young man," she explained.

 

(Continue . . . )

 

 

 

Watch '60 Minutes' Video