In these trying times, with a pandemic killing hundreds of thousands of people around the world and medical institutions preparing to be pushed to their limits, it truly is best to listen to medical professionals and heed warnings about social distancing while taking protective measures to stay inside and help flatten the curve.
With piecemeal restrictions in place in various municipalities and states, however, it’s unclear how much those efforts have helped, how long life will be interrupted and just how bad things get as science grapples with the virus, treating it and hopefully finding a cure. One thing we do know already, however, is that those that initially downplayed the virus and its impact for political reasons have done real harm to society and threatened the lives of millions of people.
There’s so much to be done and no going back on what’s been said, but The Daily Show collected some of that bad advice in a segment it called Heroes Of The Pandumbic, which largely focused on the misinformation and doubt cast by many on Fox News in the weeks before COVID-19 was detected in all 50 states and killing hundreds of people each day. Highlighting misinformation and skepticism shared by conservative voices like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and others, it’s a direct criticism of comments from just days and weeks ago that seems downright irresponsible in current conditions, especially while cities like New York deal with a crisis they haven’t seen in more than a century.
Lou Dobbs, for example, blamed the “national left-wing media” for playing up fears of the virus to hurt Donald Trump. If you haven’t been paying much attention to conservative media, it’s a great refresher of just what’s been said in the early days of the pandemic’s rise. Tomi Lahren, for example, says she’s more concerned about stepping on a heroin needle than getting coronavirus. And on and on.
The video highlights comments from the Trump administration, including Trump himself. It also shows Hannity tracking the deaths from the virus, which he basically stopped doing when the number was at zero. As of this writing, nearly 3,000 people have died in New York alone.