No longer going bananas: plague may wipe out entire fruit

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My daughters love bananas, especially Lorelei. She is four years old, which means there is much she doesn't like. She doesn't like fried chicken, or baked chicken, or any chicken unless they're in the form of chicken nuggets. She doesn't like hamburgers. She doesn't like lasagna or mushrooms or eggs. But among the few foods she loves that are nutritious, she does enjoy a good banana.

And now I'm reading that in possibly as soon as five years -- maybe as long as 30 -- there will be no bananas left. Wiped out. Finished. No longer on the Earth. Or at least no longer edible.

Johann Hari of The Seattle Post-Intelligencer wrote an interesting story recently about Panama Disease, a fungus that's been killing banana trees for about a century now. What's truly chilling is that the disease is getting stronger, and there is no cure.

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