Medicine: Invasion from the Steppes

Russian flu strikes, and the service academies are hard hit

It was no Soviet air strike but the so-called Russian flu that paralyzed the U.S. Air Force Academy, near Colorado Springs, Colo., last week. In one two-hour period, more than 500 cadets flocked to the academy's clinic. Then classes were canceled as three-fourths of the 4,312 cadets were hit with fevers, sore throats, head and body aches, and weakness.

Also immobilized by the viral onslaught was the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Md., where 3,000 or more of the 4,300 midshipmen were confined to their...