Word: cholerae
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...struggle to conquer such epidemics, and the fear they spread, is the work of a special breed. They are spiritual descendants of Dr. John Snow (1813-58), who tracked the incidence of cholera during the London epidemic of 1831 and stemmed further devastation by shutting down one of the city's water pumps. In the past few decades, his followers have significantly improved the quality of life. In much of the world they have virtually eliminated the threat of such onetime plagues as polio, smallpox, cholera and diphtheria...
That can be pretty far. A month after joining the CDC, Holmberg was on the Pacific island of Truk fighting an outbreak of cholera. For two months he was virtually isolated from his superiors, talking weekly on a short-wave radio to a CDC doctor in Hawaii to report progress and get advice. He and the health officials on Truk discovered that cholera, previously thought to be transmitted only in water, apparently was also being spread by infected people handling food in the victims' homes. Says Holmberg: "Knowing it is a food-borne disease may make quite a difference...
...briefly turned on again, though this did not help apartment dwellers; the electrically powered pumps would not work. New wells were being dug all over the city, and trucks carrying water toured every district. Much of the water was unclean and carried with it a risk of typhoid and cholera, according to U.N. health officials. People had little choice but to drink it anyway. Fresh fruit and vegetables were no longer available, flour was in short supply, and lines formed at dawn outside shops that were lucky enough to have any bread to sell. The siege came at the height...
...headlined "A Dangerous Attempt." A passerby, the item informed readers, had noticed a lighted fuse attached to Memorial Hall; at its end was enough pieric acid not only to "wreck" Memorial Hall but also to damage some adjacent buildings. Another paragraph or two describes the relese of deadly diphtheria, cholera and anthrax bacteria from "the physiological lab of Hygiene 1 in the Lawrence School yesterday...
...Naples 19 people die in a cholera epidemic caused by eating contaminated mussels. In Istanbul fishermen complain that their catch diminishes with every voyage. In Spain an outbreak of typhoid fever in a coastal town sends 20 people to the hospital. And along France's famous Côte d'Azur black pollution flags and even police lines keep bathers off beaches...