The Rotunda

Issue date: 11/4/09 Section: Features

Media Credit: Lexi Barker

So swine flu is officially a national emergency. It will come into your home, raid your fridge, sleep with your girlfriend, and not call the next day. It's so dangerous that just the mere mention of it causes people to drag out tissues, antibacterial hand washes, and surgical masks in self-defense. This cultural investment in the hysteria of disease has lead to microbiology nerds finally being cool again. Yes, your ability to discuss the finer points of virus attachment, penetration, replication, and maturation will now score you some points at the bar.

But is this really a good thing? While I don't doubt the flu's ability to cut humanity off at its knees - the epidemic of 1918 proved it can - I've noticed a bit of a trend with this up-and-coming pandemic. Yes, getting the flu is horrible, and we all wish a speedy recovery for those struck with it, but I'm starting to think that the hysteria surrounding swine flu is actually more dangerous than the disease itself.

I think a perfect example of this comes in the form of a story. Last May, I was in Washington-Dulles airport waiting to board my flight home for the summer. Swine flu was just gearing up, with reports flying around the Internet of an evil super-flu that targets young, healthy people and is taking the world by storm. There were rumors of flights being cancelled or re-routed because of this mysterious swine flu, and though the media frenzy was still in its early stages, it had hit home.

I remember standing in the terminal with my suitcase and backpack, waiting in line to answer the same security questions every seasoned traveler has committed to memory. Every time the line shuffled forward more than two steps, I'd look up at the masses of people around me, and I started to notice that something about the airport just wasn't right. It actually took me a few minutes to realize it: there were people in surgical masks wandering around as if this were normal.

Now don't get me wrong, it wasn't as if everybody there were covering up in Hazmat suits, but something about the infrequency of the masks made them all the eerier. It was as if they were waiting, because just when I hadn't seen one in a while, there was a woman in a bright blue surgical mask checking her iPhone, or a man with a shiny briefcase looking very important in his mint green mask. It was like something out of the Twilight Zone, and I haven't even gotten to the scary part yet.

Continued...

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