Yet another scare story about the new "worst yet variant" of duh Chyna virus. Hype designed to cause panic

CNN is working with the rest of the Mainstream Media to scare Americans about the supposedly lethal risk of the newest covid variant.  Nearly every line of the article increase the hyped scare.  Watch: 

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Nearly two-and-a-half years since the coronavirus pandemic began, the most infectious and transmissible variant yet has arrived.

Note that "infectious" and "transmissible" are synonyms.  Chances are most people interpret the word after the "and" as "most lethal."  No.

Repeated Covid-19 waves have left millions of people dead, with only vaccines helping to blunt the toll. 

Note how cunningly that bit of propaganda was slipped in: the author is waving away any tiny belief that most people can recover from covid with inexpensive, non-damaging, approved-for-human-use drugs like ivermectin, HCQ and zinc.  CNN wants you to believe your ONLY chance at staying alive is duh vax!

Now the virus is spreading again — evolving, escaping immunity and driving an uptick in cases and hospitalizations. The latest version of its shape-shifting, BA.5, is a clear sign that the pandemic is far from over.  The newest offshoot of Omicron, along with a closely related variant, BA.4, are fueling a global surge in cases — 30% over the past fortnight, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

"Cases" don't mean jack.  How often to you hear someone refer to "cases of the common cold"?  Cuz if you're not 80 years old or have a co-morbidity, covid isn't significantly worse than a bad cold.

In Europe, the Omicron subvariants are powering a spike in cases of about 25%, though [expert, director of bullshit for the WHO] says that number may actually be higher, given the "almost collapse in testing."

A "collapse" in testing?  You bet, because again, "cases" mean squat.

BA.5 is on the march in China...and has become the dominant strain in the United States, where it accounted for 65% of new infections last week, according to the CDC.

Yesterday Dr. Ashish Jha, the White House's Covid-19 response coordinator, said "We have been watching this virus evolve rapidly. We've been planning and preparing for this moment.  BA.5 is something we're closely monitoring."

Wow, that was almost information-free.  The author included it because it shows how gravely concerned the regime is--cuz you haven't been vaxxed against THIS variant--which, did we mention, is "the most infectious and transmissible variant yet!!!"

On the same day, WHO's Emergency Committee said Covid-19 remained a Public Health Emergency of International Concern — its highest level of alert — amid rising cases, ongoing viral mutation and increasing pressure on already overstretched health systems.

There we go with "rising cases" again.  Starting to sense a theme here?

In a statement the committee, which is made up of independent experts, highlighted challenges to the global Covid-19 response, including a drop-off in testing...

Do nations test for "cases" of the common cold?  No?  Hmmm...

Experts say official data dramatically undercount the true number of infections in the US...

"Infections" = cases, which don't mean jack if not life-threatening.  And this isn't life-threatening unless...you remember.

Some experts think there could be as many as a million new infections every day in the US!

Wailing about "infections" again.

Jha urged Americans 50 and older to get second booster shots.  Only about one in four adults in the US over 50 have gotten their recommended second boosters.

"Second booster" sounds less goofy than "fourth injection of the super-safe, "effective" non-vaccine, eh?  If they said "fourth injection" a few million more voters might begin to suspect the truth.

Adults who are up to date with vaccinations are less likely to be hospitalized than those who are unvaccinated. 

This is horseshit.  Latest figures show that 87% of Americans hospitalized with covid are triple-vaxxed.  Since only 67% of all Americans are fully vaxxed, a higher percentage of hospitalized people being triple-vaxxed (87%) than their proportion in the overall population (67%) strongly suggests that the vax does NOT make people less likely to be hospitalized--and in fact suggests that being vaxxed make you MORE likely to end up in the hospital. (Yes, I realize you need to match age cohorts to be sure.)

US health officials are urgently working on a plan to allow second Covid-19 boosters for all adults, a senior White House official confirmed to CNN on Monday, amid fears that younger adults' immunity may be waning as Covid-19 cases rise with the dominance of BA.5

"As cases rise" again.  Say, are you immune to the common cold, or has your immunity worn off?

What makes BA.5 different?  Professor Eric Topol has called BA.5 "the worst version of the virus we've seen."

 
"Worst" as in most lethal?  No, but the pull quote sure makes most people believe that.  But read on...

Topol says "It takes immune escape to the next level, and, as a function of that, greater transmissibility," well beyond earlier versions of Omicron.  In other words, BA.5 can easily evade immunity from previous infections and vaccines, increasing the risk of reinfection. 

Wow!  "It takes immune escape to the next level"!  Scares the average reader to death, but just means more transmissible--like the common cold.  So is the author ever going to address whether this scary new variant is more lethal?  Finally, 24 'grafs down, we see this:

Though the variant does not appear to lead to more severe illness, Topol said that given BA.5's immune evasion he expects to see more hospitalizations.  "One good thing is it doesn't appear to be accompanied by the ICU admissions and the deaths as previous variants."

Finally!  He expects more hospitalizations (though the reason for those isn't always clear), but does NOT see ICU patients and deaths "as [in] previous variants."  So it turns out that, as you guessed, the much-hyped "Omicron BA.5," though easily transmitted, is less dangerous.

This is a pure scare story.  Hype.  But disguised to make incautious readers believe it's more deadly.  Why would CNN do this?

Two answers come to mind:  First is to push more people to get the "new" vax supposedly specifically designed for the new variant.  See, the original vax is virtually ineffective against it, so if you're a good Democrat you'll want to rush right out and get the "new, improved" vax the moment it's approved.

Second: Hyping the fear of being infected with the scary (but less dangerous) variant is likely to enable Democrats in several states to reimpose all-mail voting in November.  And we know from ghastly experience how the Dems will use that tool.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/13/world/coronavirus-newsletter-intl-07-13-22/index.html