# 1201
The flu watching community is fortunate to have so many talented and well respected bloggers. Each day I marvel at the combined output of Flublogia, and consider myself lucky to be a small part of it.
One of our best bloggers, SophiaZoe of A Journey Through The World of Pandemic Influenza, has resumed blogging after a month long hiatus due to a family health issue.
SophiaZoe's latest blog can be read here. Welcome back, SZ!
It is only fair to disclose that SZ and I have become fast friends over the past year or so, and have been lucky enough to meet face-to-face a couple of times.
That notwithstanding, SZ is a force to behold when it comes to her knowledge of avian flu issues, and a great writer to boot. I marvel at her ability to remember obscure information that may have been released months (or even years) before, and her ability to link it to current events.
The remarkable thing is, she is not alone.
The dedication and steadiness of Crawford Kilian of Crofsblog is legend in the flu community. His site is not only resource rich, it contains a wealth of sober analysis. It belongs on everyone's daily stop.
My buddy Scott McPherson, although relatively new to Flublogia, is no stranger to pandemic issues. He has been heavily involved at the state and federal level with pandemic planning, and talks to the `heavy hitters' with regularity.
He is also a helluva writer. Knowledgeable and entertaining. A killer combination.
The Revere's of Effect Measure manage to make the science of virology, and public health policy, understandable to the layperson. And that is no easy job. Much of what I know about the science of pandemic influenza, I owe to the Reveres.
We also have a few really good newspaper reporters covering the pandemic influenza story, and they deserve mention (and praise) as well. Helen Branswell of the Canadian Press is perhaps the best known writer on avian flu, and for good reason. She never fails to impress with her ability to cogently present the facts, and her inexhaustible number of contacts in the field.
Maryn Mckenna, recently doing a lot of writing for CIDRAP, but formerly the CDC reporter for the Atlanta-Journal Constitution, and the author of Beating Back The Devil, the story of the Epidemic Intelligence Service of the CDC, is another equally bright and sane voice in the media.
There are others of course. Jason Gale of Bloomberg, Maggie Fox of Reuters, and Patrick Thibodeaux of Computerworld are making significant contributions in the mainstream media. Apologies to anyone I've left out.
The point is, we are blessed with a good many rational voices writing on this subject, and while we sometimes all cover the same story, we somehow manage to find different perspectives. And that's important. None of us are going to be able to cover all the angles of any story.
When you blog, you basically need to find one or two points and try to drive them home. Most stories have dozens of facets. By having multiple bloggers, we end up with better coverage of an issue.
A day doesn't go by when I don't write a blog, then visit Scott or Crof or SZ or the Revere's and find that they are covering the same story but from a different angle. Instead of kicking myself for not thinking of it the way they did, I consider how lucky it is to have so many takes on the same subject.
If the news is slow, and you have the time, go back through some of the older articles by these wonderful writers. Their insight on events months ago are just as valuable today as they were when they were written.
And be glad, as I am, that we have them.
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