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Many of the decision-making processes we engage in require some degree of trust. Trust characterizes nearly every relationship under the sun -- whether husband-wife, parent-child, teacher-student, doctor-patient -- including legislator-voter/taxpayer and media-consumer. With regard to this week's cover story subject -- the H1N1 flu virus and its vaccines -- the decisions made by Americans to accept the professed need for widespread immunization and the safety of government-procured vaccinations is based almost entirely on trust. People who take the time to evaluate and consider the risk-to-benefit ratio of immunization against any virus find themselves asking, "Whom should I trust?" Many of us depend upon the media for our information on this subject. Unfortunately, the dominant mainstream media is no longer worthy of our trust, most especially in matters of life and death.

The media has proven its wholesale complicity in deliberate manipulation of information/news in favor of its own agenda(s) and, more importantly, in favor of its commercial interests. The H1N1-virus controversy is no different.

If you're torn about how worried to be about the H1N1 flu virus, you're not alone.

Consider: "I think the hysteria of H1N1 concerns me the most." That's Paul M. Bolger, medical director for emergency medicine at Trinity Regional Health System.

"Let's say it's equivalent to a seasonal flu" in terms of symptom severity and mortality, countered Louis M. Katz, the medical director of the Scott County Health Department, an infectious-diseases specialist, and the executive vice president for medical affairs of the Mississippi Valley Regional Blood Center. "Multiply 30[,000] or 40,000 [typical annual deaths in the United States from seasonal influenza] times five or six, or three or four, in terms of number of deaths. It's a big deal. It's a huge deal. Both from the standpoint of what we call morbidity and mortality - illness and death - and from the impact on societal operations and infrastructure."

This is a worst-case scenario, right? "No, it's what's going to happen," Katz said.

These aren't really contradictory; they're just different perspectives. But they express the general realities about H1N1 that appear to be in conflict: Our brief experience with this new strain of influenza suggests that its symptoms are generally less severe than the seasonal flu's and that its death rate is comparable, but because there's virtually no immunity in people under 60, it has the potential to affect a greater percentage of the population and cause widespread problems.

U.S. Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) heard an earful in four town-hall meetings held this week across the central part of the state, with a majority of the large crowds telling him to put the brakes on Democratic plans for health-care reform.

At congressional town-hall gatherings across the country, opponents of the Democrats' health-care-reform proposals have been loud, angry, and in some cases involved in physical altercations with those who are supportive of President Barack Obama and Democrats. U.S. Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) experienced some of that shouting and booing during his meetings in Des Moines and eastern Iowa.

The largely conservative and Republican audience that attended Grassley's town-hall meetings in Adel, Afton, Panora, and Winterset were forceful in their condemnation of Obama and in some cases said they would vote against Grassley in 2010 if he does not stop his efforts to fashion a bipartisan health-care compromise. They occasionally mocked the few dissenting Democratic and liberal attendees who implored Grassley to embrace a government-run insurance option as a part of health-care reform.

But for the most part, the events were civil and respectful - and full. The meetings in Adel and Winterset were moved out of the public library and into a park after it became clear the large crowds would overwhelm those venues. (About 300 showed up for a morning event in Winterset; nearly 1,000 braved the heat in Adel.) The meetings in Afton and Panora were indoors and featured standing-room-only crowds of around 300 and almost 500, respectively.

"I don't want a government-run plan," Grassley said in Afton to enthusiastic applause, using a line he repeated throughout the day, each time to loud cheers.

On June 25, Alison Hart -- an aide to U.S. Senator Tom Harkin -- addressed health-care-reform issues in an open discussion with members of the public at Trinity at Terrace Park. Hart briefly spoke about current House and Senate legislation and then opened the floor for questions and comments regarding the current and future state of our nation's health care system.

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