An iatrogenic pandemic of panic

Abstract

A new pandemic with a highly pathogenic influenza strain is obviously possible. But other infectious agents present similar risks—for example, an Ebola epidemic with airborne transmission, an AIDS epidemic with a much more virulent strain of HIV (superbug), or massive food poisoning such as the dioxin crisis. Airborne transmission of the extremely lethal Ebola Zaire virus might cause a devastating epidemic and is popular in both fiction and (alleged) non-fiction. The HIV superbug appeared in February 2005 in New York as a virus with multiple mutations, multiple drug resistance, and a rapid course of infection, but in only one person. The case served to rekindle the US public's fear after interest in AIDS had been waning because of Iraq.