Paris Hilton was asked by a paparazzo yesterday if she’d heard of the swine flu and she shook her head “no” and continued to play with her Blackberry. When the photographer explained that “it’s a new flu that’s killing a lot of people in Mexico and everything,” and asked if she was concerned she said “I don’t eat that.”

The swine flu is of course spread from person to person and cannot be caught from eating pork. You wouldn’t expect Paris to know that, since she’s completely oblivious to the biggest story in the news. She must not even glance at the headlines on the papers.

I’m all for public awareness of a possible pandemic, but the swine flu coverage is over the top and it’s unnecessarily scaring the people who do pay attention. From most reports in the US, it’s responding well to antivirals and is easily treated if it’s caught soon enough. No one in the US has died from the swine flu that we know of, which can be deadly but usually only causes mild symptoms. (Update: a 23 month-old baby in Texas has died from the virus.) The government seems to have a solid plan for containing the flu and making sure there are enough drugs available to treat it. (I agree with this editorial in the LA Times that we should take sensible measures, focus on containment without penalizing immigrants and help the Mexican government as much as possible.)

Stewart quipped that swine flu ranks last on the list of things that can kill you in Mexico, with “Bullet Flu” at the top of the list. They showed a clip from CNN in which they turned the entire country of Canada red on a big map for “6 mild cases” of the flu. Stewart said “I like a good scare as much as the next guy, but for six mild cases of the flu you’re going to turn four million square miles bright red?… What does a herpes outbreak look like out there? Blood coming out of your eyes?” Maybe Paris is right not to be too concerned. She’s doing fine Hint! Hint ! read the papers listen to the news Paris...

One would wanna ask is Paris that dumb or is she tryna pull a publicity stunt...

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