Death Dust: The Valley Fever Menace

[Still Waters]

Dust storms in the West stir up microscopic spores of the toxic soil-dwelling fungus Coccidioides immitis. The Centers for Disease Control reports a tenfold increase in infections, some of them fatal.

http://www.newyorker...currentPage=all

[rodentraiser]

Wow. I had heard of Valley Fever when I moved to Bakersfield in 1974, but it either wasn't as serious then or was way under-reported. One thing I do know about Bakersfield is it has a lot of wind, a lot of oil derricks and a lot of construction. When I attended high school there, the school was built out in the boonies and sheepherders would graze their sheep behind it. We rode all over those hills on horseback. Now I understand that that area is completely built up into subdivisions and the school is surrounded by houses. That's a lot of bulldozing and dustmaking, by anyone's standards.