Thread by @poppy_haze

one of my favorite "SOCIETY" things is this 2018 cover of the news magazine The Atlantic, where a moral panic about us transgender people is front and center, and in TINY little print in the top right, "We're Not Prepared for the Next Pandemic"

2018 was the centennial of the 1918 flu pandemic which killed 25-50 million and infected 500 million, and later caused an epidemic of mysterious paralysis and dementia cases in the survivors. Every epidemiologist said 100 years means we're overdue for a major pandemic.

So this is public health under the media. Every doctor and expert telling you we're not ready, no one is prepared for the next pandemic, and the HEADLINE STORY IS: "ew trans people"

In 2009, there was a major outbreak of H1N1, the same strain that the 1918 flu came from, ended up killing over 280,000. During the vaccination drive, it turned out the vax they made which they thought would need 2 doses, only needed 1 to work, doubling supplies. We got lucky.

Meanwhile in 2013, a major outbreak of coronavirus happened called MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome. It seemed that a bat coronavirus was starting to evolve into a form that spread easily between people. However it affected Asian countries so it wasn't considered important

Every few years another outbreak of MERS coronavirus would kill people but it was mostly ignored. What are the chances another coronavirus would come right? Maybe we'll get lucky again like in swine flu? Why bother, after all, there's this minority group to spread panic about.

We’re the news! Trust us, the pundits and journalists who surely would focus on the real pressing health concerns, and were not animated by crass bigotry