Smallpox

"David Koplow gathers, organizes, and lucidly presents the large body of material from a wide range of disciplines, which bears on the important public policy question whether or not to destroy existing stocks of variola. Engagingly written and accessible to a wide audience, this book will provide both policy makers and citizens with the basic information they need to reach informed and thoughtful judgments on this urgent issue."--John S. Applegate, author of "The Regulation of Toxic Substances and Hazardous Wastes

"David Koplow's book is an important work on a crucial subject. The author brings together an extraordinary amount of information on a vital policy issue. There is nothing available that treats the issue of smallpox with any comparable degree of completeness. Koplow marshals sources from myriad disciplines in a coherent, well-rounded discussion providing a service to the casual as well as the sophisticated reader. This book is a one-stop reference, containing virtually all the information an analyst needs to know."--Barry Kellman, Director of the International Weapons Control Center, DePaul University College of Law.

The story of viruses and the story of humanity have been intertwined since the dawn of history. The first small cities formed not only the cradle of civilization, but the spawning ground for the earliest viral epidemics, the first opportunity for viruses to find a home in the human herd. This is a story of fear and ignorance, as everything from demons and the wrath of the gods to minority groups have been blamed for epidemics from smallpox to yellow fever to AIDS. It is a story of grief and heartbreak, as hundreds of thousands, sometimes millions, are wiped out in a single year. And it is a story of great bravery and sacrifice, as doctors and nurses put themselves in harm's way to combat yellow fever in Memphis and Ebola in Zaire, and as researchers risk their own lives to test theories of vaccines and the transmission of disease. Now, in Viruses, Plagues, and History, Michael B. A. Oldstone tells all these stories as he illuminates the history of the devastating diseases that have tormented humanity. Oldstone focuses his tale on a few of the most famous viruses humanity has battled, beginning with some we have effectively defeated, such as smallpox, polio, and measles. Nearly 300 million people were killed by smallpox in this century alone -- more than were killed in all the wars of the twentieth century combined. The author presents a vivid account of the long campaign against the virus, the insightful work of Edward Jenner, who created the smallpox vaccine from cowpox virus in 1796, and the monumental efforts of D. A. Henderson and an army of W.H.O. health care workers to finally eradicate smallpox. The smallpox virus remains the only organism that we have deliberately pushed to complete extinction in the wild. Oldstone then describes the fascinating viruses that have captured headlines in more recent years: Ebola and other hemorrhagic fevers, which literally turn their victims' organs to a bloody pulp; the Hantavirus outbreaks in the southwestern United States and elsewhere; mad cow disease, a frightening illness made worse by government mishandling and secrecy; and, of course, AIDS, often called "the plague of our time." And he tells us of the many scientists watching and waiting even now for the next great plague, monitoring influenza strains to see whether the deadly variant from 1918 -- a viral strain that killed over 20 million people in 1918-1919, more than twice the military and civilian casualties of the First World War -- will make a comeback. Viruses have enormous power. They have wiped out cities, brought down dynasties, and helped destroy civilizations. But, as Michael Oldstone reveals, scientific research has given us the power to tame many of these viruses as well. Viruses, Plagues, and History shows us the panorama of humanity's long-standing conflict with our unseen viral enemies, from our successes to our continuing struggles. Oldstone's book is a vivid history of a fascinating field, and a highly reliable dispatch from a worker on the frontiers of this ongoing campaign.

A discerning collection of great magazine pieces drawn from the nominees for the prestigious National Magazine Awards. Included are pieces that have appeared in The New Yorker, The Nation, Vanity Fair, & Sports Illustrated.

The Epidemic Streets represents a major advance in the historical study of death and disease in the nineteenth century. Anne Hardy has drawn on a wide range of public health records for a detailed epidemiological investigation of the behaviour of the infectious diseases in the Victorian city. Whooping cough and measles, scarlet fever and diptheria, smallpox, typhus, typhoid, and tuberculosis ravaged millions of families and made life desperately uncertain a hundred years ago; today they have almost ceased to trouble the developed world. Dr Hardy explores thefactors which helped to reduce their fatality, focusing particularly on the role of preventive medicine, and on the local and domestic circumstances which affected the behaviour of the different diseases. This is a significant contribution to the historical debate that arose from Thomas McKeown's theory ofmodern population growth, and it also extends our understanding of the ways in which Victorian society - both lay and medical - coped with the problems of endemic and epidemic infectious disease.

This book explains the historical reasons for the divergence in public health policies adopted in Britain, France, Germany and Sweden, and the spectrum of responses to the threat of contagious diseases such as cholera, smallpox and syphilis. In particular the book examines the link between politics and prevention, and uses medical history to illuminate broader questions of the development of statutory intervention and the comparative and divergent evolution of the modern state in Europe.