Neanderthals might think differently than we do. They could even be more intelligent than US. When the TIME comes to DEAL with an epidemic or getting off the planet, it's conceivable that their WAY of thinking could be BENEFICIAL.

I STARTED to write about science and MEDICINE at the 'Washington Post,' in the EARLY DAYS of the AIDS EPIDEMIC.

As a mom, grandma and GOVERNOR of Iowa, I believe we have an OPPORTUNITY and a responsibility to COMBAT the teen vaping EPIDEMIC.

The only thing wrong with the NBA - or any other professional sport, for that MATTER - is a wild EPIDEMIC of Dumbness and overweening Greed. There is no Mystery about it, and no need to CHANGE any RULES.

Cybercrime is BECOMING everything in crime. Again, because PEOPLE have connected their entire LIVES to the Internet, that's where those who want to steal money or hurt kids or defraud GO. So it's an epidemic for reasons that make sense.

Although there have been warnings that it was coming for years, the Alzheimer's epidemic is here now and millions more families will be TOUCHED by this PROGRESSIVE - and ultimately fatal - disease UNLESS its course can be altered.

Our cultural DISCUSSION of fat bodies and how we clothe them has nothing to do with HEALTH concerns, the obesity EPIDEMIC, or the comfort of fat people. It has EVERYTHING to do with what we expect from women, what we've been told by the fashion industry, and the value we PLACE on 'perfect' bodies.

Epidemics follow PATTERNS because DISEASES follow patterns. Viruses SPREAD; they reproduce; they DIE.

When there were cases of Ebola in the STATES, I respected that people wanted to address concerns and take some sort of action, but the focus TURNED completely to the U.S. At one POINT, we STARTED to wonder, Where is the Ebola epidemic happening? The States - or WEST Africa?

I don't THINK you just can put people on the starting block and then WAIT... for the NEXT Ebola-like epidemic. I think that you NEED somehow a small-capacity response who's GOING to run the first few kilometers of the marathon.

In the nineteen-eighties, rates of obesity STARTED to rise sharply in the U.S. and AROUND the world. By the nineteen-nineties, obesity REACHED EPIDEMIC proportions.

The swelling EPIDEMIC of HUMAN trafficking MAKES a mockery of the LAW and its protections.

We have an EPIDEMIC of INSECURE PEOPLE in our SOCIETY TODAY.

I have Jewish FRIENDS. I have Middle Eastern friends. I have Spanish and Italian and British and Scottish and German friends and Austrian friends, and GUESS what? They all deal with homophobia. It's an earthling epidemic; it's not isolated in the BLACK community.

When I was diagnosed I didn't know how EPIDEMIC cancer was. You FIND out that everybody you know is touched by this DISEASE.