Chapter 28: The Top Predator

Greek mythology tells the story of the unrequited love of a heartbroken demi-god who wanted to punish the princess Cassandra for rejecting him. He bestowed on her the gift of prophecy and then he cursed her never to be believed. Lederberg sounded the alarm about coming plagues beginning in the 1960s with the then newly reported Marburg virus and Lassa Fever. He connected those outbreaks with his own fear that pathogens might be developed as biowarfare agents. Epidemics and biowarfare were joined at the hip — whether accidental or deliberate, they were threats to the nation, and the world, and required research and public policy to prevent…