Phew, that's a relief

<<Coronavirus: new virus not yet a global threat>>: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-23179570

Well, that's a relief and I'm sure we're all very happy.

Now is there anything else that might have been considered a global threat but it turns out it isn't? How about the possibility of left-handed people dying younger than right-handed people? That was reported a couple of years back and had me really worried, although I couldn't really see the link between being left-handed and dying early. Or the chances of red wine causing cancer? Or red wine keeping cancer away? Both of these outcomes were reported last year. Or red meat either keeping your brain healthy or sending you to an early grave - though it was good to see the latter outcome was only if you're a man. Again, reported last year.

These reports are all said to be based on the work of 'researchers' or - heaven help us all - 'scientists.' There's hardly a day goes past without some new research being reported that stands everything we've ever known and everything common sense tells us on its head. Mondays are particularly bad: slow news days when just about any old guff is likely to be picked up and published.

Heaven help us if research grants are being handed out for stuff like this. But of course, they're not. What we have there are press handouts from universities or pharmaceutical companies sent to meeja people too lazy or too busy or too much in need of a page-filler to read beyond the first paragraph. Not for them the careful analysis of statistics, the checking of qualifications, the consultation of independent evaluators. No, no, no. Just lift a few words out of the first ten lines and voilà - an eye-catching headline!

The Guardian once reported that young Moslem women had very 'open' views on sex and marriage, 'according to researchers.' There was a shocked reaction from the Moslem community, as you would expect. Questioning elicited that the sample of young Moslem women the researcher had spoken to was 14 and they were all aged under 15. All of them attended the same youth club in the Birmingham area. And from that someone extrapolated the views of all young Moslem women...Scary stuff.

Anyone remember the Y2K virus? I suspect a few 'researchers' made a mint out of that, predicting catastrophe as computer clocks failed to cope with the change from the 20th to the 21st century. And what happened at midnight on 31 December 1999? Eh, nothing.

Exactly.