[ Saturday, January 24, 2004 ]
Book Review :
I just finished reading "Catching Cold" by Peter Davies. It talks about the influenza pandemic that killed 20-40 million people in 1918, and the scientific hunt for the virus that caused it. Its a very nice mixture of science, studies on human nature, and relevance to today. The most important lesson is that influenza is a dangerous disease - not because it causes sniffles every year or so, but because it causes widespread death about 3 or 4 times a century.
Scientists believe that when Hong Kong killed 1.5 million chickens in 1997, it narrowly averted a pandemic of the disease in humans.
How coincidental that I should finish reading this book just before the outbreaks of flu in poultry in Thailand, Vietnam and China. This is the same flu that was in Hong Kong in 1997. If it learns how to spread from human to human, it will be a major disaster for all of us.
Mike [4:25 PM]
