Being a PR man, I'm obviously interested in the mechanics displayed by big news stories as they develop across all channels. And today I have a found a great example of the use of language to mislead and sensationalise.
In the 'My View' column, the expert suggests that a virus must 'adapt' and move between hosts to survive. Nothing wrong here in principle - other than the fact that a virus cannot 'think' and that it changes due to evolutionary accident as opposed to intent. The word 'adapt' suggests that this microspopic organism has an awareness and that it's intentionally trying to move between hosts to survive.
Nothing evil (favoured Sun adj, which again has no real substance) here, probably just some odd nature accident born a result of us pumping pigs with steroids and making them live in disgustingly vile conditions so we can buy cheap meat.
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