Wendy Orent

Wendy Orent is an American anthropologist and author with special interest in pandemics. She is a freelance science writer whose work has appeared in The Washington Post and who has published numerous articles in The Sciences, The Los Angeles Times, The New Republic, Discover, and The American Prospect. Orent is currently an instructor of science journalism at Emory University.

Orent assisted Russian scientist Igor Domaradskij in the writing of his memoir, Biowarrior: Inside the Soviet/Russian Biological War Machine. Domaradskij credits himself with much of the research leading to the creation of an antibiotic resistant strain of Yersinia pestis, the plague germ. This collaboration led her to developing her own theories about the emergence of the Black Death in Europe, which she discussed in her own book, Plague: The Mysterious Past and Terrifying Future of the World's Most Dangerous Disease.

Orent was also involved in a controversial debate about the possibility of an H5N1 (bird flu) epidemic. According to Orent, there was no legitimate basis to assume that any large-scale epidemic would ensue as a result of the H5N1 virus.