Summary: This month’s hot undernews concerns the small epidemic in Ukraine, said to be caused by release of the California Flu from a US research lab. Here we do the usual diagnostic, tracing the story from its origin as propaganda by rebels to its appearance as exciting news on popular websites. How many people have come to believe this story? We have to do better if we’re to regain control of America.

“DPR Defense Ministry: Situation Report” posted by the Donbass International News Agency (DNI News), 22 January 2016 — Press release by Eduard Basurin, Vice-Commander of the Defence Ministry Corps of the Donetsk People’s Republic (rebels in eastern Ukraine). Money paragraph (bold in original)…

“According to the medical personnel of the AFU {Armed Forces units of the Ukraine} there were recorded mass diseases among the Ukrainian military personnel in the field. Physicians recorded the unknown virus as a result of which the infected get the high fever which cannot be subdues by any medicines, and in two days there comes the fatal outcome. Thus far from the virus there have died more than twenty servicemen, what is carefully shielded by the commandment of the AFU from the publicity.”

The next I see is “Deadly virus leaked from US laboratory in Donbass – DPR Army and Intelligence“, also posted by DNI News, 22 January 2016. It adds more detail.

“More than 20 Ukrainian soldiers have died and over 200 soldiers are hospitalized in a short period of time because of new and deadly virus, which is immune to all medicines. Donetsk People’s Republic intelligence has reported that Californian Flu is leaked from the same place where research of this virus has been carried out. The laboratory is located near the city of Kharkov and its base for US military experts. Information from threatening epidemic is announced by Vice-Commander of Donetsk Army, Eduard Basurin.”

The story was picked up by several dozen websites. It hit the big time rumor-mill with “US Unleashing Deadly Virus in Donbass, Ukraine?” by Stephen Lendman (bio here) at the Center for Research on Globalization, on January 24. Lendman reports as fact this propaganda from the Russia-backed rebels (the Donetsk People’s Republic has not been recognized by any nation).

Other websites re-broadcast the story, including some overseas — such as “20 Dead, 200 Hospitalized After US Lab ‘Leaks’ Deadly Virus In Ukraine” posted by Macedonian International News Agency on January 25. The story hit the major leagues when Zero Hedge posted “20 Dead, 200 Hospitalized After Reports US Lab ‘Leaks’ Deadly Virus In Ukraine” on Jan 25. With that boost it became a clickbait extravaganza.

What is the Californian Flu?

There is no “California Flu”. The term came from hysterics during the 2009 pandemic caused by the H1N1/09 virus form of swine flu Influenza A virus subtype H1N1, one strain of which was found in California: A/California/07/2009 (H1N1). Learn about it here. The best known mention of it was by President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko…

“Unlike similar epidemics in other countries, three causes of serious viral infections came together simultaneously in Ukraine – two seasonal flus and the Californian flu. Virologists conclude that this combination of infections may produce an even more aggressive new virus as a result of mutation.” {Source: Daily Express.}

Today Ukraine’s Healthcare Minister Oleksandr Kvitashvili declared a flu epidemic in the Ukraine, resulting from several influenza viruses — including the “swine flu”. It’s a commonplace event during winter. There are no mentions by reliable sources of US bioengineering the “Californian Flu”, let alone using it in the Ukraine.

Why we know so little, and much of that is wrong

“A good researcher should not be afraid to change his mind; he should not feel desperate because his comforting beliefs leave him as soon as he begins to think critically. ” — Jacques Vallée in Passport to Magonia: From Folklore to Flying Saucers (1993).

Any regular reader of comments on the internet soon realizes that Americans are often grossly misinformed (but confidently so), although the internet puts the accumulated knowledge of humanity at our fingerprints. Exploring this is a favorite subject of public opinion polls. Why do we know so much that is not so?

We can only guess at such things, but there is evidence. Look at the successful websites (massive audiences, generating serious advertising income) that provide junk information. The internet overflows with myth masquerading as fact. Such as Zero Hedge — a model publisher for 21st C America. Perhaps we consume so much misinformation for the same reason we consume so much junk food: because we enjoy it. We won’t pay for news and it is expensive to produce, so these rapidly growing clickbait vendors might become the info titans of the 21st Century.

Doing so makes so if we consume the information not as citizens but as bored consumers looking for titillation. Misinformation has no consequences if we don’t apply it. But the more we consume, the less able we are to govern ourselves.

Learning to sort fact from fable is a necessary skill for the Information Age.

For More Information

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