A Bryant

“The history of the 1918 influenza pandemic is depressing reading. It’s like watching a horror movie that you have seen before. You know who the killer is, but you can’t jump in and save the victim.”
― Jeremy Brown, Influenza: The Hundred-Year Hunt to Cure the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic

“The National Institutes of Health in Maryland keeps samples of the 1918 flu virus in a freezer at an undisclosed location. It’s not easy to get anywhere near that locked freezer, let alone inside it. First, you have to get onto the campus of the NIH, which requires identification, a reason to be admitted, and a PhD, preferably in one of the life sciences. Once you get through and find the building, a guard has to buzz you in via an airlocked entrance with double doors. Inside, you will pass through a metal detector and then be firmly guided toward a locker, where your cell phone, thumb drive, computer, pager, and camera must be deposited. Then, and only then, will you be escorted farther into the building.”
― Jeremy Brown, Influenza: The Hundred-Year Hunt to Cure the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic

“The third explanation for 1918’s lethality is that the flu virus triggered an overreactive immune response that turned the body against itself.”
― Jeremy Brown, Influenza: The Hundred-Year Hunt to Cure the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic

“The most useful definition we have is that an epidemic is a severe local outbreak, while a pandemic is a global outbreak that makes people very sick, and spreads rapidly from a point of origin.”
― Jeremy Brown, Influenza: The Hundred-Year Hunt to Cure the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic