Pandemic coverage = failed prevention policy

Something occurred to me this week when I began reading the Dallas Morning News that my carrier tossed onto my driveway.

The newspaper’s front page story count was devoted totally to the coronavirus pandemic. Then I looked at some of the inside pages. Multiple pages contained full coverage of the pandemic. The editorial page also had many letters to the editor and opinion columns devoted to the pandemic.

Then the light bulb flashed on: When have we ever witnessed such wall-to-wall, 24/7, nonstop, relentless coverage of a single issue? I guess the last issue that did that occurred on Sept. 11, 2001. That’s how big this pandemic has become.

Why mention this? Well, I also remember earlier this year when Donald Trump was downplaying the onset of the virus that he was highly critical of previous administrations’ efforts at handling earlier health crises. He mentioned the Ebola virus and the H1N1 outbreaks that dogged the Obama administration. He exerted a bit of effort to tell us that in his view President Obama did a lousy job of corralling those crises.

OK, but … did those crises dominate the media coverage — not to mention the top of everyone’s awareness — the way this pandemic has done? No. They didn’t.

What does that tell me? It tells me that those crises either weren’t as widespread as the coronavirus pandemic has become and that the Obama administration did a good job of stemming their impact on the population.

It also symbolizes and illustrates one of the fundamental points that Trump critics — such as yours truly — have made all along, which is that Donald Trump has fumbled bigly in organizing his administration’s response to the crisis.

I have to circle back to something Dr. Anthony Fauci said, which was that had there been a concerted early effort to “mitigate” the effects of the disease that we wouldn’t be in the pickle we’re in at this moment.

So, here we are … with a disease overwhelming the media’s daily coverage of the news of the day. That, I submit, is a consequence of an inept governmental response.