If you’re like me you keep track. And you see something predictable and maddening. Each time we’re faced with the outbreak of a poorly understood or new virus ( H1N1, SARS, Zika, Ebola) you can count on trusted sources of information to be writing/speaking to anyone but the average public. 

Here’s the first descriptive information you encounter on the CDC page regarding Coronavirus.  (Accessed 2/11/20)
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2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) is a virus (more specifically, a coronavirus) identified as the cause of an outbreak of respiratory illness first detected in Wuhan, China. Early on, many of the patients in the outbreak in Wuhan, China reportedly had some link to a large seafood and animal market, suggesting animal-to-person spread. However, a growing number of patients reportedly have not had exposure to animal markets, indicating person-to-person spread is occurring. At this time, it’s unclear how easily or sustainably this virus is spreading between people.  The latest situation summary updates are available on CDC’s web page 2019 Novel Coronavirus, Wuhan, China.
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And while I’m most often stressing that readability scores can only give you a surface level evaluation of the reading level of a text, take a deep breath and check out the readability of the above paragraph: 

What makes this so unreadable to millions ( certainly the 50% of the US population that reads at 8th grade and lower?

• long, multiply embedded sentences – sticking relative clauses and phrases into sentences making them complex sentences;
• passive verb constructions – identified as….
• generally difficult vocabulary – detected, indicating, reportedly, sustainably…
• difficult science concepts – a novel virus