If influenza was a rock band how would it rate its latest release, H1N1? Not too well, I suspect, despite the greatest prepublicity since—well, its previous release. And it all started so promisingly, in Mexico, whose population had been decimated by the very first outbreak of Spanish flu (and smallpox and measles), courtesy of Cortés and his conquistadores.

The new lineup—two parts pig, one part human, and one part bird (The Chimerical Brothers?)—looked brilliant on paper. Once the international tour began, all eyes were on the southern hemisphere for pointers as to how things might play out in the northern hemisphere winter. So what happened …