Scott Napper, a biochemist and vaccinologist at the University of Saskatchewan, can easily envision humanity’s ultimate doomsday disease. The scourge would spread fast, but the progression of illness…
Read more Deer Are Beta-Testing a Nightmare DiseaseWhether it begins next week, next year, or next decade, another pandemic is on its way. Researchers can’t predict precisely when or how the outbreak might begin. Some…
Read more The Other Group of Viruses That Could Cause the Next PandemicAt the start of 2022, as the Omicron variant of the coronavirus blazed across the United States, Seema Lakdawala was in Pittsburgh, finalizing plans to open a brand-new…
Read more An Adorable Way to Study How Kids Get Each Other SickUpdated at 2:45 p.m. on March 21, 2023 Last week, the ongoing debate about COVID-19’s origins acquired a new plot twist. A French evolutionary biologist stumbled across a…
Read more A Major Clue to COVID’s Origins Is Just Out of ReachFor three years now, the debate over the origins of the coronavirus pandemic has ping-ponged between two big ideas: that SARS-CoV-2 spilled into human populations directly from a…
Read more The Strongest Evidence Yet That an Animal Started the PandemicWay back in the early, whirlwind days of the pandemic, surfaces were the thing to worry about. The prevailing scientific wisdom was that the coronavirus spread mainly via…
Read more What Happened to Hand-Washing?Many, many millions of years ago, an HIV-like virus wriggled its way into the genome of a floofy, bulgy-eyed lemur, and got permanently stuck. Trapped in a cage…
Read more The Fatal Error of an Ancient, HIV-Like VirusIn less than two weeks, you could walk out of a pharmacy with a next-generation COVID booster in your arm. Just a few days ago, the Biden administration…
Read more A Simple Rule for Planning Your Fall Booster Shot
