"Cooties" refers to a highly infectious disease. The word "cootie" derives from the Tagalog word "kutu," or "parasitic biting insect." The related word "kudis" translates to "playground death." The ...

A sudden and mysterious outbreak of communicable disease began recently in my apartment building in Manhattan. Three 7-year-olds, a boy and two girls, were sharing the elevator one day with a ...

We all know that cooties aren’t real. (Besides, we’ve all been vaccinated sufficiently as kids, so we’re safe.) But if they were real, what disease would cooties be? Well, let’s look at the ...

When little boys and girls reach a certain age, they start accusing each other of having “cooties.” They regard each other as yucky and dirty because they have cooties, and avoid any contact with them ...