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From Covid to dengue, viral outbreaks seemed to be popping up all over. But maybe Americans are just more attuned to threats now.
Sept. 23, 2024, 10:48 a.m. ET
Bird flu. Mpox, formerly monkeypox. Eastern equine encephalitis. West Nile. Listeria. Dengue. Oropouche. And, of course, Covid.
Have the past few months felt like an unending parade of infectious disease?
A plethora of pathogens dominated headlines all summer, and some of that attention may have been warranted: Oropouche, a tropical infection, and dengue devastated South America; mpox is ravaging parts of Africa; and bird flu holds the potential to flare into a dangerous pandemic.
But in the United States, the threat to public health was much less alarming than it may have seemed.
Mosquitoes sickened some Americans with infections like dengue, malaria, West Nile virus and Eastern equine encephalitis. But with the exception of dengue, the viruses were less of a problem, or at least no worse, this year than last year.
The major public health troublemakers were familiar foes: Covid, measles and whooping cough, along with a litany of noninfectious threats, including drug overdoses, heart disease and cancer, said Dr. Mandy Cohen, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
What has changed is how attuned to new pathogens many Americans are after the coronavirus pandemic, she added.
