From WNYC in New York, this is NPR's On the Media.

Brooke Gladstone is away this week.

I'm Bob Garfield.

The H1N1 vaccine launched nationally on Monday, and in much of the media, it was covered

like the arrival of the Marines or the new iPhone or the Beatles.

We're tracking H1N1 with 250 million doses of the H1N1 vaccine.

It is here.

The first batch of the H1N1 swine flu vaccine has arrived in the city.

But media wouldn't be media without putting on their low concerned voices to float the sinister what-ifs. Some medical industry insiders are raising questions about the vaccine safety.

So is there a cause of concern?

All right.

Now, what do you think of the vaccination?

I have more concern about the vaccine than I do about the swine flu.

HBO's Bill Maher gave his two cents when he told his 60,000 Twitter followers they'd be idiots to get the vaccine.

Comedian, virologist, and epidemiologist. What a guy. But even if popular fears of widespread lethal side effects are unsupported by science, the fears themselves are very real. A consumer reports poll reported

that only 34% of those polled said they were definitely planning to get the vaccine.

Glenn Nowak is Director of Media Relations at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He says

they want to get the media on board to help the CDC fight the misconceptions about the vaccine.

Glenn, welcome to OTM. Thank you. Thank you for inviting me.

Now, I picked on Bill Maher because I thought his tweet was particularly irresponsible.

But I dare say there have been much larger audiences for similar messages. Is there any medium or any individual

article or broadcast that has been most destructive so far? Not one that I would single out.

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