Frozen Body Yields Clues to Epidemic

Tissue samples from the frozen body of a man buried nearly 80 years ago in the remote northwest village of Brevig Mission have yielded valuable clues about the deadly 1918 Spanish influenza epidemic that swept the globe, federal scientists said. Researchers from the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology examined genetic material from the body of an Inupiat Eskimo man, a victim of the disease that killed 85% of the villagers in a week. Records dating to the 1700s indicate that global flu epidemics occur every 10 to 30 years, said Jeffrey Taubenberger, chief of the institute’s molecular pathology division. With the last major outbreaks having occurred in 1957 and 1968, the world is due for another such experience, he said.