The Jist The Jist Of June | Page 34

Traditional outlets from across the political spectrum (including the BBC, The Inde- pendent, and The Telegraph) are currently reporting the death toll at around 58, which has risen significantly from the estimates that appeared soon after the fire. However, with Lily Allen’s claim that around “150” spreading rapidly across digital and independent media like Evolve Politics, the mistrust of mainstream media figures become more reasonable. However, it would seem unwise to make any judgements on whether death tolls had been played down until the official search of the building has been completed. The problem with disasters like this is often the media can sen- sationalise and constantly esti- mate higher death tolls in order to seem better informed, so it is nice to have a relative level of agreement amongst main- stream outlets. However, the claim that 150 people have died has yet to be substantiat- ed, especially since there are no concrete figures on how many people were in building that night. Estimates vary be- tween 100 and 600 people, so the drip tap of information from the tower site is the only real way of confirmed the number of victims. That isn’t to say dig- 34