Excessive correctness

If you ever doubted the influence of agribusiness, consider how "swine flu" has begun to vanish in less than 24 hours, replaced by "H1N1 influenza". This does not roll trippingly off the tongue, and it provides little fodder for jokes. It is another sign of the aporkalypse.

When the WHO announced it was going for the medically precise name, one shrugged. But then, one by one, the broadcast media obediently followed suit. Meanwhile, there appear to be miracles happening in Mexico, since the number of reported deaths has dropped by something like 90 percent. All those resurrected people may cause a glut in the miracle cure market.

On one joke site, A hypersensitive person of Mexican extraction was excoriating some New Zealanders who were having a bit of fun with the s****e flu and its country of origin. Now now, imagine if we still used the old nomenclature, and stuck the name of the alleged country of origin on the outbreak. Mexican flu? Yikes! There are already enough problems dogging Mexican tourism.

OK, let's see. I give the hysteria a working life of ten more days, tops. That doesn't mean that influenza of all kinds stops being a source of concern: it just means an end to the complication of witless panic-mongering.