In 2001 a terrorist attack with anthrax killed five people and transfixed America. In 2002 an outbreak of West Nile virus killed 284 people nationally in six months and sparked headlines for weeks, along with enough fear to change people’s behavior. In 2003 SARS killed over eight hundred people around the world, froze Asian economies, and frightened millions of people in Hong Kong, Singapore, and elsewhere into wearing masks on the streets. In 1918 fear moved ahead of the virus like the bow wave before a ship. Fear drove the people, and the government and the press could not control it. They
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