Absurdity
CDC Declares Children Fully Eradicated After Decades Of Dangerous Transmission
By BSN Staff, . BSN Network. Satire.
ATLANTA, GA. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Monday that it had achieved the complete and verified eradication of children from the United States, ending what agency officials described as a centuries-long public health crisis that had gone largely unaddressed due to what one internal memo called 'societal sentimentality and the greeting card industrial complex.'
The announcement was made at a morning press conference in Atlanta, where CDC Director Dr. Pamela Groff stood before a podium flanked by two large charts showing disease transmission rates plummeting to zero alongside a second chart showing the nation's youth population doing the same thing.
'Today marks a turning point,' Dr. Groff said, adjusting her glasses with the calm energy of someone who has just reorganized a very messy cabinet. 'Children were, by every measurable metric, the single most efficient disease delivery system this country has ever produced. More efficient than contaminated water. More efficient than international travel. More efficient, frankly, than anything we have ever had to contend with.'
She then clicked to a slide that read: 'Phase One Complete.'
The CDC's case against children has been building for years. Agency data showed that children were responsible for transmitting influenza, hand-foot-and-mouth disease, strep throat, stomach bugs, and what researchers classified as 'a generalized aura of biological chaos' to adults, elderly relatives, teachers, pediatricians, and anyone within a twelve-foot radius of a birthday party bounce house.
Children, for their part, had no comment, on account of having been eradicated.
Parents across the country reacted to the news with a complicated mixture of grief and the specific exhaustion of someone who spent eleven consecutive years not sleeping past 6 a.m. on a Saturday.
'I mean, obviously it's a loss,' said Denver resident Craig Altman, 41, standing in what used to be a playroom and is now just a room full of Legos nobody has to step on anymore. 'But I haven't had a sinus infection since February, so.'
Altman trailed off and looked at the middle distance for a long time.
His wife, Donna Altman, noted that the family's grocery bill had dropped by sixty percent and that she had read four books since Tuesday.
Public health experts have praised the eradication as a landmark achievement while acknowledging that the CDC's communication strategy surrounding the initiative left something to be desired. The agency's 340-page implementation report, released alongside the announcement, refers to children exclusively as 'mobile biological incident units' and describes the eradication process using a phrase, repeated fourteen times, of 'proactive population-level wellness optimization.'
Nobody in the report uses the word 'children.' Not once.
'We want to be very clear that this was a public health intervention, not a, and I want to be precise here, a thing that sounds like something else,' said CDC spokesperson Ronald Finch, reading carefully from a prepared statement while not making eye contact with any of the journalists in the room.
Critics have raised concerns. The American Academy of Pediatrics released a statement calling the eradication 'deeply troubling,' though observers noted the organization may now be facing an existential crisis of its own. The teachers' unions have not yet responded, possibly because it is the first quiet morning any of them can remember.
Schools across the country sit empty. Chuck E. Cheese filed for bankruptcy again, this time for different reasons. The toy industry has collapsed. YouTube Kids has gone dark. And somewhere in suburban Ohio, a grandmother is staring at a refrigerator covered in drawings and has not moved in several hours.
Dr. Groff closed the press conference by reiterating that the CDC remains committed to the health and safety of all Americans, and noted that Phase Two would be announced at a later date.
She did not say what Phase Two was.
The Legos remain.
The story we are making fun of: https://theonion.com/cdc-successfully-eradicates-children/