# 4977
Maryn McKenna, everyone’s favorite `scary disease girl’, brings us details of a recent importation of Lassa fever into the United States in her Wired Superbug blog, and at the same time discusses our visceral fears of exotic and rare VHF’s (Viral hemorrhagic Fevers).
Movies like Outbreak (1995) and books like Tom Clancy’s Executive Orders have helped to instilled into western culture a deep seated dread and fascination for diseases like Lassa, Ebola, and Marburg.
This, despite the fact that more mundane killers like coronary artery disease, pneumonia, HAI’s (Hospital Acquired Infections) and influenza kill many hundreds of times more people each and every year.
Maryn presents a thoughtful piece on the real dangers presented by these exotic diseases, our reactions to them, and along the way even manages to use the word `horripillate’ in a sentence.
More than enough reasons to recommend that you read:
Lassa fever: Coming to an airport near you
By Maryn McKenna
