Infectious Diseases: Cholera Resurgent

The epidemic began four years ago with a savage invasion of the Philippines, and the marauding microbes steadily expanded their area of attack. Java, Sumatra, Thailand, the Indian subcontinent, all suffered high casualty rates. Cholera, a disease that had just been written off as almost conquered, was once more on the rampage.

This time trouble had come in an unexpected form. The deadly bacillus was not a familiar strain of Vibrio cholerae (or Vibrio comma, from its shape), for which a vaccine of sorts is available. Instead, it was a strain of the El Tor group of vibrios,* one which...

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