Sunday, February 14, 2010

H1 N1 and the semantic game


ATLANTA (AP) — Swine flu cases are down, but health officials say the disease's cumulative impact has grown to 57 million U.S. illnesses, 257,000 hospitalizations and 11,690 deaths.
I'm not buying it. That is over 1/6th of the entire US population. That would mean that one in six of the people I meet daily would have had the illness. Yet, I know not one.

Then again, it all hinges on what the meaning of the word "is" is. Anyone want to take a stab at the meaning behind "cumulative inpact." I think it has something to do with pinball.