Why did SARS cause a panic?
B: It was new to our experience, although presumably it has been out there in the world for many years. It’s frightening to people because they don’t know its full capabilities; they don’t know how to respond to it. The virus clearly had spread fairly widely before we were aware of it, and that made it more scary. You didn’t know where it was and where it wasn’t. Do you think that the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control handled the outbreak correctly? B: I think they handled it wonderfully. The CDC mobilized itself very rapidly. The United States ended up basically free of the disease a few patients, no deaths. And the WHO offered its assistance widely and helped the Vietnamese very early, so that they got rid of their problem. If WHO had gotten into China as early as last fall, they might have been able to prevent the whole thing. Why were you so critical of the media? B: I think the problem we have in such a fearful moment is that the media doesn’t put enoug
