This stage of the pandemic is confusing. Here are 6 ways newsrooms can help

Covering coronavirus has never been easy — and the task journalists face has become even more complex in the recent days and weeks. Sometimes, in such scenarios, it can be helpful to step back and question some of the basic aspects of the way stories are being reported and discussed. That is what I did on Wednesday and I was left with six ideas about how to improve coverage across the board.

— WaPo’s editorial board: “If we truly want this miserable pandemic to end, we have to act — together, and with a clear sense of what it will take to put it behind us…” (WaPo)
— David Leonhardt breaks down the “polarization problem and a communication problem” facing the CDC… (NYT)
— Tucker Carlson continued fear mongering about the vaccines Wednesday. Dartmouth’s Brendan Nyhan remarked, “We’re so desensitized but Fox is choosing to beam this nonsense out to millions of people every day during a deadly pandemic. Lives are literally at stake…” (Twitter)
— Dr. Aaron E. Carroll notes how reality is very different for vaccinated and unvaccinated people: “Despite this difference, reporting on the relative percentage of Delta cases every day is causing vaccinated people to panic and sowing some doubt about the effectiveness of vaccinations…” (NYT)
— A reminder there is so much we don’t know about Covid: “This is a puzzler. Coronavirus cases are plummeting in Britain. They were supposed to soar. Scientists aren’t sure why they haven’t…” (WaPo)

Tech and entertainment giants react to changing circumstances

>> Twitter said that it has “made the decision” to close its opened offices in New York and San Francisco and “pause future office reopenings…”
>> Google said that it will delay its return to office from September until October. The company also said that it will mandate vaccinations for employees….
>> Facebook said that all of its employees will need to be vaccinated before they return to the office…
>> Apple said it will restore a mask mandate at most of its stores in the US for employees and customers. That will apply to those who are vaccinated as well…

>> Netflix said it will mandate that staff working adjacent to talent will need to be vaccinated…

>> Disney said it will require masks, regardless of vaccination status, at Disneyland and Walt Disney World…

“Corporate America’s vaccine floodgates are opened”

That’s how journalist Benjy Renton put it, linking to this CNN story. David Frum on “Erin Burnett OutFront” predicted Wednesday night that “by this time next month, the majority of Fortune 500 companies will be saying you have to be vaccinated if you want to work for us. This is the pandemic of the willfully unvaccinated — the anti-socially unvaccinated…”

For the record, part two

— “Researchers found that vaccine resistance among people who get their info from Facebook was second only to Newsmax viewers,” Whitney Kimball writes… (Gizmodo)
— “A year-old watchdog group placed body bags in front of Facebook’s offices in Washington, D.C., as part of a protest over disinformation on the social network,” Erin Carson reports… (CNET)
— “Let’s keep the vaccine misinformation problem in perspective”: Gilad Edelman says that “social media is not the reason the pandemic hasn’t been conquered…” (WIRED)

source: cnn.com