The History Book Club discussion

This is a thread which discusses diseases and books about them: (either non fiction or historical non fiction)

Here is a good book to start off the thread:

by Siddhartha Mukherjee

Goodreads Write-up:

Cancer is among the most dreaded of diseases, often mentioned in whispers or euphemisms. (The very word is a curse in Dutch.) Whatever we call it, "the big C" is unavoidable in any language: According to the World Cancer Report, it will become the worldwide leading cause of deaths in 2010. Siddhartha Mukherjee's The Emperor of All Maladies lifts the taboo by presenting a history of cancer in the context of both of miscomprehensions and advances in its detection and treatment. As a cancer physician and researcher whose articles have appeared in a wide variety of publications, the author approaches the subject with a rare combination of expertise, humanity, and writing skills. A Discover Great New Book Selection. (A sample of prepublication testimonials: "Rarely have the science and poetry of illness been so elegantly braided together as they are in this erudite, engrossing, kind book.")

Awards:

Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction (2011)

you beat me to it.. it does sound like a good book !

by Siddhartha Mukherjee

Yes, it is...great minds think alike.

Another:

Randy Shilts

Goodreads Write-Up:

By the time Rock Hudson's death in 1985 alerted all America to the danger of the AIDS epidemic, the disease had spread across the nation, killing thousands of people and emerging as the greatest health crisis of the 20th century. America faced a troubling question: What happened? How was this epidemic allowed to spread so far before it was taken seriously? In answering these questions, Shilts weaves weaves the disparate threads into a coherent story, pinning down every evasion and contradiction at the highest levels of the medical, political, and media establishments.

Shilts shows that the epidemic spread wildly because the federal government put budget ahead of the nation's welfare; health authorities placed political expediency before the public health; and scientists were often more concerned with international prestige than saving lives. Against this backdrop, Shilts tells the heroic stories of individuals in science and politics, public health and the gay community, who struggled to alert the nation to the enormity of the danger it faced. And the Band Played On is both a tribute to these heroic people and a stinging indictment of the institutions that failed the nation so badly.

Awards:

Stonewall Book Award (1988), ASJA Outstanding Book Award (1988), National Book Critics' Circle Award Nominee (1987)

I recently picked this up at the bookstore.
by Molly Caldwell Crosby
The American Plague delves into America's not-so-distant past to recount one of the greatest epidemics of our time. It tells the story of the yellow fever epidemic in Memphis, Tennessee-one that would cost more lives than the Chicago fire, San Francisco earthquake and Johnstown flood combined-and, it is a narrative journey into Cuba and West Africa, where a handful of doctors would change medical history.

Yellow fever, a virus born of the slave trade, struck 500,000 Americans over two centuries touching every state from Texas to Massachusetts. It paralyzed governments, halted commerce, quarantined cities and altered the outcome of wars. It was not only the gruesome symptoms of the disease-much like those of Ebola today-but the long-term, crippling effect on a place and its people that made it such a dreaded disease and one that the federal government could not ignore.

In 1900, the United States sent three doctors led by Walter Reed to Cuba to discover how this disease was spread. Camped on sprawling farmland just outside of Havana, they launched one of history's most controversial human studies. Two of the doctors would be infected; one would die. Two-dozen men-veterans of the Spanish-American War-would volunteer to be test subjects.

Tragic and terrifying, The American Plague beautifully depicts the story of yellow fever, and its reign in this country. A story that, in the end, is as much about the nature of human beings as it is the nature of disease.

The life-saving story behind the Iditarod.
by Gay Salisbury
In 1925, a deadly diphtheria epidemic swept through icebound Nome, Alaska. The life-saving serum was a thousand miles away, and a blizzard was brewing. Airplanes could not fly in such conditions: only the dogs could do it. Racing against death, twenty dog teams relayed the serum across the Alaskan wilderness as newspapers nationwide headlined the drama, enthralling an entire generation. The heroic dash to Nome inspired the annual Iditarod Dog Sled Race in Alaska and immortalized Balto, the lead dog whose arrival in Nome over a snow-blown trail was an American legend in the making. His bronze statue still stands in New York City's Central Park, in dedication to the "Endurance, Fidelity and Intelligence" of the dogs that saved Nome. This is their story, the greatest dog story never fully told, until now. 2 maps, 48 illustrations

I had a great great great grandfather who was a Captain of his own ship and he died of yellow fever in Cuba at a very young age.

Bentley wrote: "I had a great great great grandfather who was a Captain of his own ship and he died of yellow fever in Cuba at a very young age."

It is remarkable when you look back on some of these things and the number of people who died. The magnitude is staggering. And because the extent of science was not as developed as it is today people were tragically lost at a young age.

Very true; in my ancestor's case; he left a young family and wife.

Read this awhile ago. Scary.
by Richard Preston
The true story of how a deadly virus from the central African rain forest suddenly appears in a Washington, D.C., animal test lab. In a matter of days, 90% of the primates exposed to the virus are dead, and secret government forces are mobilized to stop the spread of this exotic "hot" virus. HC: Random House.

Tragic, Bentley.

Yes, I read that book too...it was scary.

Alisa wrote: "Read this awhile ago. Scary.
by Richard Preston
The true story of how a deadly virus from the central African rain forest su..."

I wonder if this event was the inspiration for the virus Tom Clancy used in Executive Orders.

by Tom Clancy

Alisa wrote: "The life-saving story behind the Iditarod.
by Gay Salisbury
In 1925, a deadly..."

This is such an inspiring story. Someday I hope to read a good book about it. I'll keep this one in mind. :)

Here is another one:

The Family That Couldn't Sleep

D.T. Max

Goodreads Synopsis:

In 1765, Venetian doctors were stumped by the death of a man who had suffered from insomnia for more than a year and spent his final months paralyzed by exhaustion. Over the next two centuries, many of his descendants would develop similarly fatal symptoms, with a range of misdiagnoses, from encephalitis to alcohol withdrawal. Finally, in the early 1990s, their disease was recognized as a rare genetic form of prion disease. The family reluctantly shared their history with Max, who has written about science and literature for the New York Times Magazine and other publications. Max (inspired in part by his own neuromuscular disorder) has crafted a powerfully empathetic account of their efforts to make sense of their suffering and find a cure. But this is only half the story. Looking at prion disease in general, Max doubles back to the English mad-cow epidemic of the 1990s, retracing established backstories among New Guinea aboriginals and European sheep herds. There's enough fascinating material—in particular, a theory suggesting that early humans were nearly wiped out by a plague spread by cannibalism—to keep readers engaged, but they're likely to want still more about the genuinely captivating family drama

Here's another Pulitzer Prize winner:


by David M. Oshinsky

Goodreads Synopsis:
Here David Oshinsky tells the gripping story of the polio terror and of the intense effort to find a cure, from the March of Dimes to the discovery of the Salk and Sabin vaccines—and beyond. Drawing on newly available papers of Jonas Salk, Albert Sabin and other key players, Oshinsky paints a suspenseful portrait of the race for the cure, weaving a dramatic tale centered on the furious rivalry between Salk and Sabin. He also tells the story of Isabel Morgan, perhaps the most talented of all polio researchers, who might have beaten Salk to the prize if she had not retired to raise a family.
Oshinsky offers an insightful look at the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, which was founded in the 1930s by FDR and Basil O'Connor, it revolutionized fundraising and the perception of disease in America. Oshinsky also shows how the polio experience revolutionized the way in which the government licensed and tested new drugs before allowing them on the market, and the way in which the legal system dealt with manufacturers' liability for unsafe products. Finally, and perhaps most tellingly, Oshinsky reveals that polio was never the raging epidemic portrayed by the media, but in truth a relatively uncommon disease. But in baby-booming America—increasingly suburban, family-oriented, and hygiene-obsessed—the specter of polio, like the specter of the atomic bomb, soon became a cloud of terror over daily life.
Both a gripping scientific suspense story and a provocative social and cultural history, Polio opens a fresh window onto postwar America.

Pulitzer Prize for History (2006)

If you think about it, it is kinda weird how interesting it is to read about diseases. I guess it is kinda like war. Terrible thing, yet interesting to read about.

Probably for sure Elizabeth.

Here is another one:

Pox Americana: The Great Smallpox Epidemic of 1775-82

Elizabeth A. Fenn

Publisher's Synopsis:

The astonishing, hitherto unknown truths about a disease that transformed the United States at its birth

A horrifying epidemic of smallpox was sweeping across the Americas when the War of Independence began, and yet we know almost nothing about it. Elizabeth A. Fenn is the first historian to reveal how deeply variola affected the outcome of the war in every colony and the lives of everyone in North America.

By 1776, when military action and political ferment increased the movement of people and microbes, the epidemic worsened. Fenn's remarkable research shows us how smallpox devastated the American troops at Québec and kept them at bay during the British occupation of Boston. Soon the disease affected the war in Virginia, where it ravaged slaves who had escaped to join the British forces. During the terrible winter at Valley Forge, General Washington had to decide if and when to attempt the risky inoculation of his troops. In 1779, while Creeks and Cherokees were dying in Georgia, smallpox broke out in Mexico City, whence it followed travelers going north, striking Santa Fe and outlying pueblos in January 1781. Simultaneously it moved up the Pacific coast and east across the plains as far as Hudson's Bay.

The destructive, desolating power of smallpox made for a cascade of public-helath crises and heartbreaking human drama. Fenn's innovative work shows how this mega-tragedy was met and what its consequences were for America.

During the years when the Revolutionary War transformed thirteen former British colonies into a new nation, a horrifying epidemic of smallpox was transforming—or ending—the lives of tens of thousands of people across the American continent. This great pestilence easily surpassed the war in terms of deaths, yet because of our understandable preoccupation with the Revolution and its aftermath, it has remained virtually unknown to us. Elizabeth A. Fenn is the first historian to reveal how deeply Variola affected the outcome of the War of Independence, and why it caused a continental epidemic, affecting the lives of virtually everyone in North America from Florida to Alaska.

Political ferment and military actions helped to spark the initial outbreaks of the dreaded illness on the East Coast, where the pox struck first in Boston. As the contagion of liberty spread, this gruesome contagion of pestilence spread with it, striking Native Americans, Continental soldiers, and settlers of both European and African descent. Smallpox devastated the American troops in Quebec and kept them at bay during the British occupation of Boston. Soon the disease affected the war in Virginia, where it ravaged slaves who had escaped to join the British forces. And during the terrible winter at Valley Forge, General Washington had to decide if and when to attempt the risky inoculation of his troops.

In 1779, while Creeks and Cherokees were dying in Georgia, the pox broke out in Mexico City, whence it followed travelers north, striking Texas and then erupting in Santa Fe and outlying pueblos in January 1781. From there the epidemic ravaged the northern plains and wrought havoc among the Indians trading furs at the Hudson Bay. Simultaneously, it reached the Pacific coast and extended to what is now southeastern Alaska. Fenn argues persuasively that not only the war but the expansion of the European world economy—and with it the acquisition of the horse by plains Indians; the increase in intertribal conflict aggravated by access to guns; the trade in furs and other goods; the Spanish pattern of colonization, missionization, and silver mining—created the circumstances for this unprecedented continental epidemic.

The destructive, desolating power of smallpox made for a cascade of public-health crises and heart-breaking human drama. Fenn explores the many different ways this megatragedy was met, and analyzes the consequences. Her brilliant book is a signal contribution to the study of infectious diseases which immensely increases our understanding of the interplay between devastating pestilence and historical change. And it transforms our picture of the American Revolution.

"Elizabeth Fenn provides a dazzling new perspective that embraces the entire continent . . . [and she] recovers the larger picture that we have long missed . . . A story that is timely as well as powerful and sobering."—Alan Taylor, The New Republic

"A terrifying contagious disease, the threat of biological warfare and an American population 'living a life of incessant dread': Elizabeth A. Fenn's Pox Americana goes back to the future to examine an all-too-relevant part of our past. The American Revolution coincided with a smallpox plague that swept across North America, decimating the population and determining the course of history. From the nature of the many references on which Ms. Fenn's lively research draws, it's clear that the epidemic has generally been regarded as a footnote to the full story of the Revolutionary War. Or it has figured tangentially in accounts of explorers' forays into the New World. Not this time: Ms. Fenn's entire focus is on the disease, how it spread and where its larger importance lies . . . The book explains [her subject] in scholarly yet detective-like detail . . . Using sources as varied as the burial records kept by Catholic priests in the Southwest and the diaries of explorers travelling up the Pacific coast, she pieces together a gripping, untold story."—Janet Maslin, The New York Times

"Elizabeth Fenn provides a dazzling new perspective that embraces the entire continent . . . [and she] recovers the larger picture that we have long missed . . . A story that is timely as well as powerful and sobering."—Alan Taylor, The New Republic

"A considerable achievement and an extraordinary work of history that uncovers an episode that reshaped America as surely as the War of Independence."—Garance Franke-Ruta, The Washington Monthly

"A chilling portrait of the first contact between the New World and the [smallpox] virus . . . [Fenn] chronicles smallpox's influence on early American history [and] musters strong evidence of early biowarfare . . . Pox Americana fills out the historical record, illuminating in vivid detail a pandemic that stretched from Alaska to Brazil and took more lives than America's war of independence . . . A meticulously researched study of public health policy challenging—and defeating—an incurable disease."—Philip Herter, The [Cleveland] Plain Dealer

"With Pox Americana
cf0, Fenn has made a stunning contribution to American Revolution studies."—Michael Kenney, The Boston Globe

"A richly detailed and comprehensive portrait of smallpox at a now-forgotten but nonetheless epochal moment in its long past . . . A fascinating and invaluable case study of the way an epidemic can, as it spreads with blind impartiality, fuse such apparently unrelated phenomena as the American Revolution, the Canadian fur trade and the Spanish missions of the West . . . Fenn makes us re-imagine . . . an era of polyglot complexity, with widespread populations scattered across the continent, only dimly aware of each other at all, and pursuing (simultaneously or in sequence) different preoccupations as they battled the same catastrophic illness . . . That insight alone brands Pox Americana as a considerable achievement."—Mark Caldwell, Newsday

"[Fenn] has made fresh use of many primary sources . . . to put together a remarkable portrait of an epidemic that killed five times more people on the entire continent than the War of Independence did in the east."—The Economist

"After the flood of works that talented scholars have devoted in recent years to the American Revolution, who could have expected a major new study of an unexamined and scarcely suspected dimension of it? That is what Elizabeth Fenn has produced in this extraordinary book, which concerns the workings of a catastrophic epidemic that shaped both the course of the Revolutionary War and the way people lived throughout the North American continent."—Edmund S. Morgan, Yale University

"With impressive research and sparkling prose, Elizabeth Fenn addresses a greatly neglected subject: a smallpox epidemic that not only was continent-wide but had the real possibility of derailing the War of Independence. Pox Americana is an excellent book."—Don Higginbotham, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

"I thought that the most important participants in the saga of North America in the era of the American Revolution were the Native Americans, African Americans, Patriots, Redcoats, and French. Elizabeth A. Fenn convinces me that I must add the smallpox virus to the list of protagonists or fail to comprehend the actions of all the others."—Alfred W. Crosby, author of The Columbian Exchange

"Many books have been written about smallpox, but few have this volume's scholarly focus. Fenn (history, George Washington University) relies heavily on primary documents to illustrate the disease's devastating impact on the political and military history of North America during the Revolutionary War. Excerpts from diaries, letters, presidential papers, and church and burial records provide first-hand accounts of the spread of this disease. The result is an extensive discussion of the role of smallpox in the Colonial era, but the book's main strength is in the detailed analysis of smallpox among Native Americans, from Mexico to Canada."—Tina Neville, University of South Florida at St. Petersburg, Library Journal

"In this engaging, creative history, Fenn addresses an understudied aspect of the American Revolution: the intimate connection between smallpox and the war. Closed-in soldiers' quarters and jails, as well as the travel demands of fighting, led to the outbreak of smallpox in 1775. George Washington ended an outbreak in the north by inoculating American soldiers (the colonists had a weaker immune system against smallpox than the British). Indeed, Fenn makes a plausible case that without Washington's efforts, the colonists might have lost the war. Despite the future president's success at 'outflanking the enemy' of smallpox, however, the disease spread on the Southern front, where there was 'chaos, connections, and a steady stream of victims.' Even as the war ended, the increased contact between populations spread the disease as far as Mexico and the Pacific Northwest. The outbreak eventually killed an estimated 125,000 North Americans more than five times the number of colonial soldiers who died (to her credit, Fenn admits that these numbers are inexact). Along the way, Fenn, who teaches history at George Washington University, recounts the fate of many blacks freed under a British 'emancipation proclamation' of sorts; promised their freedom if they fought for the British, several thousand ex-slaves perished from smallpox. She also traces the disease's effect on the North American balance of power by devastating some Native American tribes in the 1780s. Long after the war, whites kept Native Americans passive with explicit threats of infection. Fenn has placed smallpox on the historical map and shown how intercultural contact can have dire bacterial consequences."

Here are a couple of interesting sounding books about smallpox.

The Demon in the Freezer (2002)

Goodreads blurb:

In he Demon in the Freezer, his first nonfiction book since The Hot Zone, a #1 New York Times bestseller, Richard Preston takes us into the heart of Usamriid, the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick, Maryland, once the headquarters of the U.S. biological weapons program and now the epicenter of national biodefense.

Peter Jahrling, the top scientist at Usamriid, a wry virologist who cut his teeth on Ebola, one of the world’s most lethal emerging viruses, has ORCON security clearance that gives him access to top secret information on bioweapons. His most urgent priority is to develop a drug that will take on smallpox-and win.

Eradicated from the planet in 1979 in one of the great triumphs of modern science, the smallpox virus now resides, officially, in only two high-security freezers-at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta and in Siberia, at a Russian virology institute called Vector. But the demon in the freezer has been set loose. It is almost certain that illegal stocks are in the possession of hostile states, including Iraq and North Korea. Jahrling is haunted by the thought that biologists in secret labs are using genetic engineering to create a new superpox virus, a smallpox resistant to all vaccines.

Usamriid wentinto a state of Delta Alert on September 11 and activated its emergency response teams when the first anthrax letters were opened in New York and Washington, D.C. Preston reports, in unprecedented detail, on the government’s response to the attacks and takes us into the ongoing FBI investigation. His story is based on interviews with top-level FBI agents and with Dr. Steven Hatfill.

Jahrling is leading a team of scientists doing controversial experiments with live smallpox virus at CDC. Preston takes us into the lab where Jahrling is reawakening smallpox and explains, with cool and devastating precision, what may be at stake if his last bold experiment fails.

by Richard Preston

Smallpox: The Death of a Disease: The Inside Story of Eradicating a Worldwide Killer (2009)

Dr. Henderson offers the inside story of how he led the World Health Organization's campaign to eradicate smallpox--the only disease in history to have been deliberately eliminated. Foreword by Preston, author of "The Hot Zone."

by D.A. Henderson (no photo)

Kathy, thanks for the addition. Sounds scary.

I started to read this one and it was fascinating:

The Secret History of the War on Cancer (2007)

From Goodreads:

The War on Cancer set out to find, treat, and cure a disease. Left untouched were many of the things known to cause cancer, including tobacco, the workplace, radiation, or the global environment. Proof of how the world in which we live and work affects whether we get cancer was either overlooked or suppressed. This has been no accident. The War on Cancer was run by leaders of industries that made cancer-causing products, and sometimes also profited from drugs and technologies for finding and treating the disease. Filled with compelling personalities and never-before-revealed information, The Secret History of the War on Cancer shows how we began fighting the wrong war, with the wrong weapons, against the wrong enemies-a legacy that persists to this day. This is the gripping story of a major public health effort diverted and distorted for private gain. A portion of the profits from this book will go to support research on cancer prevention.

by Devra Lee Davis

Interesting, Cleo, thanks.

Roy M. Anderson(no photo)

How do diseases spread? Different diseases spread differently: by air, by physical contact, through sexual contact and other ways as well. In this book the mathematical details of how epidemiologists figure the spread of disease are detailed. This book is NOT for those scared of math. But, if you want some details of how diseases are modeled, this is a classic.

The story of Dr. Walter Reed and his fight to identify the cause and come up with the cure for yellow fever, commonly called Yellow Jack.

Yellow Jack

by John Robinson Pierce

Synopsis

The end of a scourge
"The prayer that has been mine for twenty years, that I might be permitted in some way or some time to do something to alleviate human suffering, has been answered!"
--Major Walter Reed, writing to his wife, New Year's Eve, 1900
As he wrote to his wife of his stunning success in the mission to identify the cause of yellow fever and find a way to eradicate the disease, Walter Reed had answered the prayers of millions. For more than 250 years, the yellow jack had ravaged the Americas, bringing death to millions and striking panic in entire populations. The very mention of its presence in a city or town produced instant chaos as thousands fled in terror, leaving the frail, the weak, and the ill to fend for themselves.
Yellow Jack tracks the history of this deadly scourge from its earliest appearance in the Caribbean 350 years ago, telling the compelling story of a few extraordinarily brave souls who struggled to understand and eradicate yellow fever. Risking everything for the cause of science and humanity, Reed and his teammates on the U.S. Army Yellow Fever Board invaded the heart of enemy territory in Cuba to pursue the disease--and made one of the twentieth century's greatest medical discoveries. This thrilling adventure tells the timeless tale of their courage, ingenuity, and triumph in the face of adversity.

The Philadelphia Chromosome: A Mutant Gene and the Quest to Cure Cancer at the Genetic Level
by Jessica Wapner

Synopsis
One of Publishers Weekly’s Top Ten Spring 2013 Science Books

Philadelphia, 1959: A scientist scrutinizing a single human cell under a microscope detects a missing piece of DNA. That scientist, David Hungerford, had no way of knowing that he had stumbled upon the starting point of modern cancer research—the Philadelphia chromosome. This book charts not only that landmark discovery, but also—for the first time, all in one place—the full sequence of scientific and medical discoveries that brought about the first-ever successful treatment of a lethal cancer at the genetic level.

The significance of this mutant chromosome would take more than three decades to unravel; in 1990, it was recognized as the sole cause of a deadly blood cancer, chronic myeloid leukemia, or CML. This dramatic discovery launched a race involving doctors and researchers around the world, who recognized that in principle it might be possible to target CML at its genetic source.

Science journalist Jessica Wapner brings extensive original reporting to this book, including interviews with more than thirty-five people with a direct role in this story. Wapner reconstructs more than forty years of crucial breakthroughs, clearly explains the science behind them, and pays tribute to the dozens of researchers, doctors, and patients whose curiosity and determination restored the promise of a future to the more than 70,000 people worldwide who are diagnosed with CML each year. Chief among them is researcher and oncologist Dr. Brian Druker, whose dedication to his patients fueled his quest to do everything within his power to save them.

The Philadelphia Chromosome helps us to fully understand and appreciate just how pathbreaking, hard-won, and consequential are the achievements it recounts—and to understand the principles behind much of today’s most important cancer research, as doctors and scientists race to uncover and treat the genetic roots of a wide range of cancers.

Alisa wrote: "The Philadelphia Chromosome: A Mutant Gene and the Quest to Cure Cancer at the Genetic Level
[bookcover:The Philadelphia Chromosome: A Mutant Gene and the Quest to Cure Cancer at the Genetic Level|..."

Oooo....this looks like a fascinating history of medicine book for my TBR pile. Thanks for the add...

Glad to hear it, Judy. Let us know what you think when you get around to reading it.

thanks for letting us know

I read this a couple of years ago and it is chilling. The author has done an immense amount of research and in the last chapter he offers the arguments and theories of modern scientists regarding the question..... "was it bubonic plague, pneumonic plague, anthrax, or some unknown illness that died out after its dance of death?" A very interesting and informative telling of one of the greatest catastrophes in the history of mankind.



The Great Mortality: An Intimate History of the Black Death
by John Kelly

Synopsis

La moria grandissima began its terrible journey across the European and Asian continents in 1347, leaving unimaginable devastation in its wake. Five years later, twenty-five million people were dead, felled by the scourge that would come to be called the Black Death. The Great Mortality is the extraordinary epic account of the worst natural disaster in European history -- a drama of courage, cowardice, misery, madness, and sacrifice that brilliantly illuminates humankind's darkest days when an old world ended and a new world was born.

Bentley wrote: "Here is another one:

The Family That Couldn't Sleep

D.T. Max

Goodreads Synopsis:

In 1765, Venetian doctors were stumped by the..."

Fascinating! Thanks for posting! I just added it. :)

I highly recommend Mira Bartok's memoir, The Memory Palace. It is a shockingly sad, but sometimes funny account of her mother's battle with schizophrenia. I think stories like this are important for everyone to read, especially given the woeful lack of understanding and concern for the mentally ill in this country...

Tia, thanks for the post. Good job with the citation, but remember to also add the author photo (when available) and author link using the add book/author feature that you used for the cover, consistent with our rules.

Sounds like a really interesting book.
by Mira Bartok

Alisa wrote: "Tia, thanks for the post. Good job with the citation, but remember to also add the author photo (when available) and author link using the add book/author feature that you used for the cover, cons..."

So sorry about that! I am positively new to Goodreads and I'm a little overwhelmed with the format and such. I will make sure to add those next time. Again, my apologies! :)

No worries, Tia. If you need a hand we can help you out. You can always practice on our mechanics of the board thread, here: http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/2...

check out the orientation for our group, here:
http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1...

our guidelines: http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/5...

and if you have not already done so, pop over the introduction thread and tell us a little about you.

Glad you are jumping into the discussions. You will get the hang of it soon enough.

I read this book earlier this year, and I thought it was pretty good - very interesting, but a little dry at times. It tells the history of rabies, the myths and remedies made up because of it, and the discovery of the rabies vaccine.

by Bill Wasik and Monica Murphy

Synopsis

In the tradition of The Emperor of All Maladies and The Great Influenza, journalist Bill Wasik and veterinarian Monica Murphy chart the history, science, and cultural mythology of rabies. In the absence of vaccination— as was true for thousands of years, until the late nineteenth century—the rabies virus caused brain infections with a nearly 100 percent fatality rate, both in animals and humans, and the suffering it inflicted became the stuff of legend.
The transmission of the virus—often from rabid dog to man—reawakened a primal fear of wild animals, and the illness’s violent symptoms spoke directly to mankind’s fear of the beast within. The cultural response was to create fictional embodiments of those anxieties—ravenous wolfmen, bloodsucking vampires, and armies of mindless zombies.
From the myth of Actaeon to Saint Hubert, from the laboratories of the heroic and pioneering Louis Pasteur to a journalistic investigation into the madness that has gripped modern Bali, Rabid is a fresh, fascinating, and often wildly entertaining look at one of the world’s most misunderstood viruses.

The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance
by Laurie Garrett

Synopsis
Unpurified drinking water. Improper use of antibiotics. Local warfare. Massive refugee migration. Changing social and environmental conditions around the world have fostered the spread of new and potentially devastating viruses and diseases—HIV, Lassa, Ebola, and others. Laurie Garrett takes you on a fifty-year journey through the world's battles with microbes and examines the worldwide conditions that have culminated in recurrent outbreaks of newly discovered diseases, epidemics of diseases migrating to new areas, and mutated old diseases that are no longer curable. She argues that it is not too late to take action to prevent the further onslaught of viruses and microbes, and offers possible solutions for a healthier future.

I am cuurently reading a very interesting book called byBarry E. Zimmerman

I have also just purchased byHelen Bynum this book takes a look at tuberculosis.

I am going through a disease phase at the moment.

Funny, Michael. Thank you for the adds.

Will do.

Michael if you want to add another one on diseases you might check out Brain on Fire. Just finished it last night and it was fascinating and more than a little scary. Quite a story of one woman's journey through a little known disease.
by Susannah Cahalan

Tuberculosis, formerly called "consumption" was a killer for which no cure was known. Stricken individuals were placed in sanitariums and treated like criminals (and that was in the 20th century!). This book looks at TB as the "white plague".


The Invincible Microbe: Tuberculosis and the Never-Ending Search for a Cure

by Jim Murphy

Synopsis

This is the story of a killer that has been striking people down for thousands of years: tuberculosis. After centuries of ineffective treatments, the microorganism that causes TB was identified, and the cure was thought to be within reach—but drug-resistant varieties continue to plague and panic the human race. The “biography” of this deadly germ, an account of the diagnosis, treatment, and “cure” of the disease over time,and the social history of an illness that could strike anywhere but was most prevalent among the poor are woven together in an engrossing, carefully researched narrative.

Cheers for the suggestions. I will be boring people about TB for ages.

Kathy wrote: "Michael wrote: "Cheers for the suggestions. I will be boring people about TB for ages."

LOL, I know what you mean. My friends and acquaintances are always saying to me, "You read what!?""

I know that reaction, Kathy!!!!

Rats, Lice and History

by Hans Zinsser (no photo)

Synopsis

This popular and unusual book by Hans Zinsser, a brilliant physician and researcher, takes an unusual look at history by examining the influence of diseases on society, and will prove a fascinating read for anyone with an interest in biology or medical history.

The Cancer Chronicles: Unlocking Medicine's Deepest Mystery

by George Johnson (no photo)

Synopsis:

When the woman he loved was diagnosed with a metastatic cancer, science writer George Johnson embarked on a journey to learn everything he could about the disease and the people who dedicate their lives to understanding and combating it. What he discovered is a revolution under way—an explosion of new ideas about what cancer really is and where it comes from. In a provocative and intellectually vibrant exploration, he takes us on an adventure through the history and recent advances of cancer research that will challenge everything you thought you knew about the disease.

Deftly excavating and illuminating decades of investigation and analysis, he reveals what we know and don’t know about cancer, showing why a cure remains such a slippery concept. We follow him as he combs through the realms of epidemiology, clinical trials, laboratory experiments, and scientific hypotheses—rooted in every discipline from evolutionary biology to game theory and physics. Cogently extracting fact from a towering canon of myth and hype, he describes tumors that evolve like alien creatures inside the body, paleo-oncologists who uncover petrified tumors clinging to the skeletons of dinosaurs and ancient human ancestors, and the surprising reversals in science’s comprehension of the causes of cancer, with the foods we eat and environmental toxins playing a lesser role. Perhaps most fascinating of all is how cancer borrows natural processes involved in the healing of a wound or the unfolding of a human embryo and turns them, jujitsu-like, against the body.

Throughout his pursuit, Johnson clarifies the human experience of cancer with elegiac grace, bearing witness to the punishing gauntlet of consultations, surgeries, targeted therapies, and other treatments. He finds compassion, solace, and community among a vast network of patients and professionals committed to the fight and wrestles to comprehend the cruel randomness cancer metes out in his own family. For anyone whose life has been affected by cancer and has found themselves asking why?, this book provides a new understanding. In good company with the works of Atul Gawande, Siddhartha Mukherjee, and Abraham Verghese, The Cancer Chronicles is endlessly surprising and as radiant in its prose as it is authoritative in its eye-opening science.

Although this book studies the health hazard of "black lung" in Britain, it is totally appropriate to the situation that exists in the mining industry of the United States. I live in a state which is based on a single economy (coal), so we have several special programs targeted at black lung and health clinics which treat only black lung patients. The disease is still a huge problem even with the latest safety measures.

Miners' Lung

by Arthur McIvor (no photo)

Synopsis:

Arthur McIvor and Ronald Johnston explore the experience of coal miners' lung diseases and the attempts at voluntary and legal control of dusty conditions in British mining from the late nineteenth century to the present. In this way, the book addresses the important issues of occupational health and safety within the mining industry; issues that have been severely neglected in studies of health and safety in general. The authors examine the prevalent diseases, notably pneumoconiosis, emphysema and bronchitis, and evaluate the roles of key players such as the doctors, management and employers, the state and the trade unions. Throughout the book, the integration of oral testimony helps to elucidate the attitudes of workers and victims of disease, their 'machismo' work culture and socialisation to very high levels of risk on the job, as well as how and why ideas and health mentalities changed over time. This research, taken together with extensive archive material, provides a unique perspective on the nature of work, industrial relations, the meaning of masculinity in the workplace and the wider social impact of industrial disease, disability and death. The effects of contracting dust disease are shown to result invariably in seriously prescribed lifestyles and encroaching isolation. The book will appeal to those working on the history of medicine, industrial relations, social history and business history as well as labour history.

It really is - some friends of mine who have family in Wales have spoken about it.

Old men coughing up their lungs and gasping for breath. It is terrible but even worse when you have younger men who are also stricken. That shows that the modern "safety and prevention" guidelines are obviously being ignored......either by the company or the workers themselves.