The alarm went off at 7 a.m. the morning my wife and I were
leaving for Hawaii some years ago – but I was already awake. I
had been hit early in the evening with severe nausea and stomach
cramps. The ride to the airport was pretty rough, but the eight-
hour flight to the island paradise was near misery. I spent most
of my time at cruising altitude out of my seat and, shall we
say, indisposed. Pretty soon, I knew that I had been struck by
the dreaded norovirus. In retrospect, I recalled a similar
illness among co-workers the previous week. Noroviruses are
actually a whole family of viruses, which collectively are
responsible for more than 20 million cases of gastroenteritis in
the United States each year. Gastroenteritis is a viral
infection of the stomach and intestines. The main symptoms
include nausea, vomiting, stomach cramps and frequent watery
diarrhea. Norovirus is extremely infectious. It is passed along
in fecal matter (yes, that means poop), typically on the hands
of infected persons or on the inanima