We Can’t Expect the Government to Save Us From Disease-Carrying Mosquitoes

The Arrival of the Zika Virus in the U.S. Reminds Us That the First Line of Defense Is Our Own Backyards

“We need you to come take a look at something.” Ecologist Angela Brisco and technician Marc Mitchell, employees of the San Gabriel Valley Mosquito and Vector Control District, peered over the short wall of my cubicle. Whenever our staff neglected to use my “front door,” I knew something was wrong.

They showed me a single female mosquito under the microscope. It didn’t look good: I focused up and down, trying desperately to make the black and white stripes on her legs and the white “ax mark” on her thorax disappear.

“Where …

By Kenn K. Fujioka | February 18, 2016

Vaccinations Have Always Been Controversial in America

While Creating the Polio Vaccine, Jonas Salk Had to Deal With Critics Like Walter Winchell, Who Warned, "It May Be a Killer"

By Charlotte DeCroes Jacobs | August 4, 2015

In 1952, Americans suffered the worst polio epidemic in our nation’s history. As in prior outbreaks, the disease spread during the summer, mainly attacking children who had been exposed to …

Are Ebola Patients America’s New ‘Lepers’?

A Century Ago, Panic over Leprosy Led to Rampant Stigma and Bizarre Quarantines

by Marcia Gaudet | October 30, 2014

The reaction to Ebola isn’t new. Few things alarm people as much as the perceived danger of a deadly or devastating disease. History shows that responses to epidemics often lack …

Do Hugs Work Better than Quarantines?

President Obama's Reassuring Embrace of a Recovered Ebola Patient Was the Best Way to Say the Virus Can Be Beaten

by George Merlis | October 29, 2014

The Constitution stipulates that the president is the commander-in-chief of the nation’s armed forces, but chief executives since Washington have accrued to the office a number of additional unstipulated “in-chief” …

Ebola Is Bad, But Measles Was Worse

This Year’s Terrifying Outbreak Won’t Spread as Far or as Fast as Historic Epidemics

by Gerardo Chowell-Puente | October 6, 2014

As an epidemiologist who works with mathematical models to analyze outbreaks, I can tell you–despite the disclosure of a U.S. case in Dallas last week–there is some good news in …

California Has a Mosquito Problem

A Global State Invites Global Insects. Is It Prepared to Bite Back?

by Robert K. Washino | March 25, 2014

One stifling July evening in 1952 a recently discharged Marine veteran, home from Korea, was spending the Fourth of July weekend camping at Lake Vera in the rolling foothill terrain …

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