The role of the press in the COVID-19 pandemic

As usual, the media covers the COVID-19 pandemic daily, reporting updates and concerns to their viewers.

There are some stories that do not only bring new information to light, but also show the possibilities, doubts, and speculations pertaining to COVID-19.

On May 13, CNN published a story titled Updated CDC guidance: People vaccinated against Covid-19 can go without masks, indoors and outdoors. According to the director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, people who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 do not need to wear masks or socially distance, except under certain circumstances.

This article seems like great news to those who are vaccinated or are thinking of getting vaccinated, but things seems to switch up pretty quickly.

On May 14, CNN published a story titled New York Yankees say 8 vaccinated members tested positive for Covid-19. Here’s how that could happen. Right off the bat, this is big news considering that people have been told that people who are vaccinated against COVID-19 no longer need to wear masks due to their newly formed immunity.

In this story, eight members of the New York Yankees have tested positive for COVID-19 despite the fact that they are all vaccinated with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine two weeks prior.

The article goes on to inform that the single dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine was 72% effective unlike the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna which are both 95% effective.

Their defense was that if someone who is fully vaccinated still gets COVID-19, their symptoms will not be as severe unlike an unvaccinated person, according to Dr. Jonathan Reiner.

Brainstorming

Of course the media makes unintentional mistakes, but how many of them are intentional? It seems like information is changing every day, which happens naturally, but sometimes things change so much and have little to no consistency that I wonder if some of the media is just telling the stories they want in order to lead a narrative.

Not only the media, but social media as well has such an impact on daily users due to the constant information, misleading information, fact-checking everything but in a biased way, and the list could go on.

On social media, a number of those who are vaccinated are still stingy when it comes to mask wearing. It almost seems like their goal in life is to be the employee at the front of a store handing out masks so they will feel better about how they are bettering America.

Those who do not like wearing masks are often shamed and are told that they must not care about people because they choose not to wear a mask.

In the end, the media and society as a whole needs to stick to proven facts instead of trying to make reality whatever they want it to be.