b'Editorhotels and beaches throughout his state to remain open for Spring Break. Pelosi urgedLets start with the projection models provided by infectious disease experts. people to visit San Franciscos Chinatown to celebrate the Chinese New Year. TheWe think this is how it works: start by accepting the premise that news media is wide-angle lens showed few on top of Covid-19 before the markets crashed. an entertainment business, in that, if it bleeds, it leads. When you are hired as a The first deaths from the disease in Italy were reported on February 21st, andstringer (an affiliate reporter) for a major news agency like, for example, Agence on the 29th in the U.S. During the last week of February, neither the federal gov- France Presse (AFP), the European equivalent of the Associated Press, you receive in-ernment nor any of the states took any visible action to prepare for what could bestructions and guidelines from your regional editor. The most important part of those on its way, by determining all of the assets and resources that would be needed toguidelines is the kind of stories that the agency is looking for, which includes terms handle the threat, should the disease spread across the countrypersonal protectivelike airplanes crashing into buildings on the list of material that will get your story equipment (PPE), ventilators, sanitizing supplies, and most importantly, Covid-19bought and into circulation. Also understand that most university research grants test kits. Additionally, no action was taken to provide special protection for the mostare funded by private, philanthropic foundations and major corporations. A big part medically vulnerable members of society, as indicated by how the disease was af- of justifying ones existence as a researcher, and more importantly ones funding, is fecting victims on the other side of the world. One would have thought thatgoinggetting your work into the press when your time comes. So, if we are hit with a viral latein the spread of Covid-19 would have given the U.S. an advantage in preparingpandemic, it helps if you can get on TV with your prediction modeland the best way for what other countries had been dealing with for weeks. In the same way that theto do that is to predict the end of the world. Whether it proves correct or not, is quite government we count on to look out for our safety should be able to warn us about abeside the point. If we commit economic suicide in the process, so be it.slow-to-develop hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico, is it really too much to expect ourWhile every predictive model of cases and deaths from Covid-19 in the U.S. has public health officials and elected leaders to get us ready for a virus that was killingproven overstated again and again, theyre simply revised down and new graphs people for weeks before making it to the U.S.? are sent for broadcast on the news networks. Nueces is among the least affected Considering the first serious warning about Hurricane Harvey was issued threelarge counties in the U.S., with no deaths as of press time, among the lowest case days before making its catastrophic landfall over Mustang Island, uhhhyes? Ap- loads per capita, and one of the lowest growth rates of confirmed cases, that is ac-parently it is, and the fact that no master response plan was in place for a viraltually going down. Nonetheless, two researchers from Texas A&M University Corpus pandemic at any level of governmentand that they are all, clearly, making it up asChristi offered their predictions for Covid-19 infections in the nine-county Coastal they go alongillustrates that we learned absolutely nothing from the Spanish Flu. Bend area to elected leaders and news media. Drs. Chris Bird and Philippe Tissot Fifty million dead? Meh. presented their models based on the worst case scenario (no social distancing) and under the current Stay Home if You Can order and closure of businesses deemed YES, THEY ARE HERE TO SCARE US. THATS THEIR JOB. non-essential, characterized as best case. They predicted 10,000 to 87,000 total As members of news media, in one form or another, for decades, please accept an- infections (Whatarange!) by the May 1st peak. This was on Friday, April 10th, a day other apology, as we shake our heads in disgust over the behavior of our colleagues. that saw zero new cases in Nueces County. Since the first case here was reported on 18 THE COASTAL BEND MAGAZINEFEATURED: The Stories that Mattered TheCoastalBend.com'