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61st out of 565 books
—
840 voters
Flu: The Story Of The Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus that Caused It
by
Gina Kolata
When we think of plagues, we think of AIDS, Ebola, anthrax spores, and, of course, the Black Death. But in 1918 the Great Flu Epidemic killed an estimated 40 million people virtually overnight. If such a plague returned today, taking a comparable percentage of the U.S. population with it, 1.5 million Americans would die. In Flu, Gina Kolata, an acclaimed reporter for The N...more
Paperback, 352 pages
Published
January 9th 2001
by Touchstone
(first published 1999)
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I love a good disease book. And I think the 1918 flu is just about as fascinating as you can get. But this book talks more about theories and old-timey labs than it does about the human side of this epidemic. Which, let's face it, is what's really interesting. Imagine all of a sudden having a common illness sweep through your community and kill young healthy people so fast that you don't even have time to bury them right. That's some serious shit. This book just didn't do it justice. I would lik...more
Oct 26, 2008
Xysea
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
history buffs, those with science and microbiology and investigative interests
Recommended to Xysea by:
me
Shelves:
book-on-home-shelf
Right now, I'm thoroughly enjoying this read by NYT reporter Gina Kolata - it does seem odd that with the impact of the 1918 flu we haven't heard more about it or how it changed American life as we know it.
I had no idea Katherine Anne Porter's Pale Horse, Pale Rider dealt with this topic, nor Thomas Wolfe's Look Homeward, Angel, so I am going to now read these two books after this one with a different context and knowledge base - which I hope will give me a deeper appreciation for both.
I'll be...more
I had no idea Katherine Anne Porter's Pale Horse, Pale Rider dealt with this topic, nor Thomas Wolfe's Look Homeward, Angel, so I am going to now read these two books after this one with a different context and knowledge base - which I hope will give me a deeper appreciation for both.
I'll be...more
2 likes · like · see review
The book was published in 1999, but it reads like it was written just a few weeks ago. The information Gina presents is so relevant to today that it's eerie. I am fascinated by the parts of history that our textbooks seem to forget, and the 1918 flu is probably one of the largest omissions in our historical texts. In it's two phases ( lighter spring outbreak, followed by the massively deadly fall outbreak) it managed to decrease the world population significantly and took out more lives than WW1...more
1 like · like · see review
Sep 19, 2008
Schnaucl
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
anyone interested in the Spanish Flu, virology, or pandemics
I really enjoyed this book. The book covers a range of time from the beginning of the 1918-19 flu right up to still lingering questions about what made that particular flu strain so deadly and why it affected the young and healthy as much as the elderly and very young.
I really learned a lot about the Flu and about the fight to determine its origins and genetic composition. Some of the things in this book mirrored [Book:The Great Influenza:The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague in History], altho...more
I really learned a lot about the Flu and about the fight to determine its origins and genetic composition. Some of the things in this book mirrored [Book:The Great Influenza:The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague in History], altho...more
An interesting look at a part of our history that can get glossed over sometimes. Unfortunately, this was focused more on the science that went into deciphering the flu rather than the history of the flu itself. While it was an enlightening read, and some of the people who worked on this project were extremely driven, fascinating people, mostly it just made me want to read a good old fashioned history book about the influenza pandemic.
My one real issue was the completely unnecessary pages of lis...more
My one real issue was the completely unnecessary pages of lis...more
“FLU The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus that Caused It”
The virus of the horrible 1918 Flu Pandemic is, apparently, still something of a mystery. Our history books give the pandemic precious little space although it killed 40 million people. More of our soldiers were killed by the flu than died in WW I. It killed healthy young adults in a matter of days. Why the counterintuitive deaths? Why did it appear everywhere so quickly? Why did it kill so fast? W...more
The virus of the horrible 1918 Flu Pandemic is, apparently, still something of a mystery. Our history books give the pandemic precious little space although it killed 40 million people. More of our soldiers were killed by the flu than died in WW I. It killed healthy young adults in a matter of days. Why the counterintuitive deaths? Why did it appear everywhere so quickly? Why did it kill so fast? W...more
This was a fascinating look at the hunt for the flu virus of 1918 which killed an estimated 100 million people worldwide. The title is a little misleading--this is less a story of the pandemic than it is the story of later scientists who tried to study the virus.
Kolata explores the efforts to find the flu virus in the lungs of its victims, specifically those who were buried in permafrost and whose bodies might be preserved with the fragile virus still in their lungs. It's disheartening to see h...more
Kolata explores the efforts to find the flu virus in the lungs of its victims, specifically those who were buried in permafrost and whose bodies might be preserved with the fragile virus still in their lungs. It's disheartening to see h...more
This was on the shelf at the library when I went to get The Great Influenza so I picked it up too. I read this one first---it was shorter. While the basis of the book was the 1918 Influenza, the real story was what happened in science and medicine afterward. While influenza was a known disease, the cause was not yet understood. There were no microscopes powerful enough to see a virus, and by the time anyone thought that might be the cause, the flu was gone, seemingly lost forever. The bulk of th...more
Get sick, Get well, Hang around the inkwell.
First the good. This timely and credible treatment of influenza fills a critical void. The book is very readable. Although concentrating on historical vignettes to the exclusion of scientific explanations, the book provides a helpful background for the consideration of risk, public policy, and personal preparation that arise from confusing, contradictory, and incomplete news items about flu outbreaks and related public health initiatives.
Kolata clearly...more
First the good. This timely and credible treatment of influenza fills a critical void. The book is very readable. Although concentrating on historical vignettes to the exclusion of scientific explanations, the book provides a helpful background for the consideration of risk, public policy, and personal preparation that arise from confusing, contradictory, and incomplete news items about flu outbreaks and related public health initiatives.
Kolata clearly...more
Apr 12, 2007
Jennifer
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
non-scientists, people who forget things easily
she is so damn repetitive and rambling i can't stand it! she also tries to hard to mention names of specific scientific methods, then doesn't explain them, which is aggravating (i would assume) for those who don't know what they are.
the story has so many dead endings, im sure she could have found some better stuff to write on, or else write a book about something else.
anyway, i didn't like it. but somehow i did finish it, so thats why it got two stars.
the story has so many dead endings, im sure she could have found some better stuff to write on, or else write a book about something else.
anyway, i didn't like it. but somehow i did finish it, so thats why it got two stars.
1 like · like · see review
I think this book did a pretty good job of what is almost 100 years of history related to the flu, and to the advancements scientists have made in figuring out the flu and the 1918 flu in particular... which isn't to say they've actually Figured It Out, it's to say that scientists have managed to find out the code for that virus, but not how it spread, where it came from, where it went. So the mystery is still out there, and seeing as this book was published in 1999 I'm pretty curious as to the...more
May 18, 2009
Nancy
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
anyone interested in the history of illnesses.
Fascinating account of the search for the virus that caused the 1918 Influenza pandemic. The author also covers some of what scientists have learned from flu outbreaks throughout the 20th century, including how influenza strains from pigs and chickens can be transmitted to humans (and vice versa), and how they can combine to form new, more violent, strains. She also covers the Swine Flu vaccination efforts of 1976 and the problems and lawsuits it caused for the government.
Because the book was pu...more
Because the book was pu...more
The so called "Spanish flu" pandemic of late 1918/early 1919 is one that has seemingly fallen off the face of the earth. Out of all the American and World History classes I have taken in my life, I can't recall ever studying the 1918 flu. Not in any great detail, at any rate. Which, after having read this book, seems strange considering the massive impact the outbreak had on the entire world.
The number of people killed by the flu - conservative estimates have the number at 20 million, though som...more
The number of people killed by the flu - conservative estimates have the number at 20 million, though som...more
Aug 03, 2011
Patrice
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
nonfiction,
epidemiology
This book was fascinating. I'm not accustomed to thinking of Influenza as being particularly dangerous, but as the author pointed out the 1918 pandemic was one of the deadliest (by death toll rather than per capita unless perhaps you consider as a rate with respect to time) plagues in human history. That is even more unique in that the world seems to be collectively blocking it from memory rather than preserving it in record as it has with outbreaks of other infectious diseases. In twelve solid...more
A fascinating book about the 1918 "spanish" flu pandemic that swept the globe, killing an estimated 20 million to more than 100 million people worldwide. The virus was most deadly to adults aged 20 to 40 - a portion of the population not usually as vulnerable to infectious disease. The death toll was so high that in the United States the average life expectancy dropped by 12 years.
The book explores the spread of the virus and the search for it remnants in tissue samples to discover why it was so...more
The book explores the spread of the virus and the search for it remnants in tissue samples to discover why it was so...more
I found this fascinating. I don't know why...I'm so not a science-y person. But I really knew very little about this part of history and it had such a huge impact on the world. I also like stories about the inside happenings of things and so the part about how the scientists were trying to figure things out and the politics of it all I found very interesting.
Definitely don't read this while eating, though. Some of the descriptions of the flu's affects are quite grotesque. Very scary - made me re...more
Definitely don't read this while eating, though. Some of the descriptions of the flu's affects are quite grotesque. Very scary - made me re...more
I was expecting the historical account but this book traces the effort to retrieve samples of the 1918 flu strain. It was interesting but some of the science intrigue didin't grab me as it would others. Still, for the knowledge gained, I found it worthwhile.
On one point I must take issue with the writer. She described social conditions at the height of the flu epidemic as people coping but simply carrying on with their lives. She made it sound as if the illness hitting communities was a nuisanc...more
On one point I must take issue with the writer. She described social conditions at the height of the flu epidemic as people coping but simply carrying on with their lives. She made it sound as if the illness hitting communities was a nuisanc...more
This is a badly thought-out, poorly written book. It reads like a science column from People magazine, if there were such a thing. Kolata spends a lot of space exploring the feelings and relationships of those involved. It does not help the story, it confuses it. The book is badly organized in other ways. There is no coherent story line, and it seems to end in the middle of a thought. We understand that the story of influenza is not finished, but it would be nice if the book was.
I do enjoy learn...more
I do enjoy learn...more
A science detective story regarding the 1918 flu pandemic that killed 25% of the American population and estimates of up to 100 million people worldwide. It began in the spring of 1918, subsided, and returned in the fall of that year after having mutated into the most virulent killer the planet has ever seen. This is the very exciting story of how scientists must work as detectives in order to understand and prevent such an epidemic from occurring again. Although I read this book a few years ago...more
If you are into virology or mystery illnesses this will be a fascinating read for you. You will learn about the process scientists use in labs when they are trying to figure out the genetic code to make a vaccine. You will find out why the world's most dengerous viruses come from the Hong Hong area and how a virus can start out in birds, move on to pigs, and then humans. And for the record I did find out that after this book was written they found out why healthy adults were the ones that died f...more
Mar 06, 2012
Corinne
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Susan Frazin
This is one of the most interesting -- and most frightening -- books I have ever read. I can highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in and/or concerned about the future nature of Flu Viruses and the possible recurrence of another deadly one like that of the 1918 Flu Pandemic. The statistics are stunning -- not the least of which is the fact that this particular Flu Virus killed the healthiest individuals (young adults) in the population, rather than the elderly and children, who have be...more
My mother had been recommending this book to me for ages, and given the swine flu scare earlier this year I finally decided to read it. Good suggestion, mom!
I normally get bored by non-fiction, but this one kept me interested all the way through to the last pages, and even left me wanting more of the "story." Kolata starts out by giving some history of the 1918 flu pandemic, then moves on to other, more recent flu epidemics. She finishes by discussing modern attempts to sequence the 1918 virus u...more
I normally get bored by non-fiction, but this one kept me interested all the way through to the last pages, and even left me wanting more of the "story." Kolata starts out by giving some history of the 1918 flu pandemic, then moves on to other, more recent flu epidemics. She finishes by discussing modern attempts to sequence the 1918 virus u...more
Retrieved from my mom's husband's library (Doc Gilbert, nee Hedgecock) after he died; Doc's daughter Mary's note was tucked inside -- "[this book" may for you, Dad, put a missing puzzle piece in place. . ." Doc's mother had died of the 1918 flu - shortly after he was born, and Doc was raised by neighbors (the Gilberts) when his father and older brothers moved from the plains to California to find work and survive. Fascinating read; a chronology of the medical sleuthing over the years and contain...more
I grew into quite the germ nerd when my interest in public and community health was at its zenith, and it was at that point that I bought this book. Now, 4 years later in 2009, was the perfect time for me to be enthralled by the history of influenza. As the threat of another round of swine flu rages, I got to read about the original swine flu that showed up after the 1918 flu, and the scare in the 70s that led to a faulty faccination campaign. We have certainly learned from history, and one thin...more
I read this when it first came out just after having the flu for the first time. (There is so much more to the flu than a bad cold.)I loved the science and the story. My grandmother survived the 1918 Flu. . . but her mother buried three children. Public health is not an issue we take seriously anymore in this country. We don't trust the CDC or such agencies. Our privilege has allowed for cynicism as well as a loss of our medical history. . . before antibiotics or bendryl. We are all genetic surv...more
Reading this in tandem with Berry's book on Influenza. This book takes a narrative approach, telling both the story of the flu pandemic and the story of twenty-first century efforts to uncover frozen samples of the flu virus preserved in frozen corpses in the arctic circle. It's a little light of history compared to Barry's book, and still doesn't quite manage to convey the utter horror that the epidemic represented. Taken together, the two books paint a clear picture of the pandemic, but each a...more
Interesting. The book ends before some intriguing new data was available, which is a little disappointing. There's a large section in the middle about the swine flu scare of 1976, which I didn't understand why it was necessary to include in a book about the flu of 1918, but I guess it's to illustrate the difficulty of preparing for an epidemic, and dealing with the aftermath of what happens when the epidemic doesn't happen. Immunization seems like a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" game o...more
”This is a detective story. Here was a mass murderer that was around 80 years ago and who’s never been brought to justice. And what we’re trying to do is find the murderer.”--Jeffery Taubenberger, molecular pathologist
There are estimates that the 1918 Flu killed anywhere from 20 million to 100 million people dwarfing the number of people killed in World War One. Either number is horrifying, but as modern scientists start putting data together the larger number becomes more realistic. I’ve always...more
There are estimates that the 1918 Flu killed anywhere from 20 million to 100 million people dwarfing the number of people killed in World War One. Either number is horrifying, but as modern scientists start putting data together the larger number becomes more realistic. I’ve always...more
42 likes · like · see review
Gina Kolata's telling of the story of the 1918 influenza pandemic reveals how modern medicine, basking in the success that the new germ theory of disease had brought, was utterly unprepared for, and therefore completely helpless in the face of, the pandemic that ravaged the world. This flu was unlike any flu encountered before: it was 25 times more lethal than ordinary influenzas, killing 2.5 percent of its victims, in contrast to the normally observed 0.1 percent mortality. Worldwide, possibly...more
Nov 04, 2009
Sunkyoung Lee
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
history,
epidemiology
Pandemic Influenza 관련된 일을 시작하기에 앞서 텍스트 용으로 주문했던 책이다. 병리학사라는 흥미로운 접근으로 1918 독감을 추적하고 분석하려 한 것은 주목받을 만한 시도였다.
그러나 내가 이 책을 읽은 시기가 너무 늦어서 그런가 (이 책이 처음 나왔을 때- 원서 출판년도 1999, 번역본 출판년도 2003년 -는 큰 반향을 일으켰겠지만 올해는 새로운 pandemic flu가 최고조를 이루고 있다.) 아니면 번역이 조금 엉성해서 그런가, 뉴욕타임즈의 1999년 올해의 책이었던데다 이 책에 수여된 각종 찬사들에 비해서는 구성이 치밀하지 않다.
가장 실망했던 부분은 미국 정부의 대국민 예방 접종 챕터에서 그 큰 규모의 캠페인을 중단하게 한 결정적인 발견이 무엇이었는지 구체적으로 밝히지 않은 부분이다(232쪽). 한 과학자가 자다가 벌떡 일어나 떠오른 생각을 곧장 정부에 제출해 전국 규모의 캠페인이 결국 중단되기까지 했다면서 어떻게 그 부분을 전혀 설명하지 않았는지 이해할 수...more
그러나 내가 이 책을 읽은 시기가 너무 늦어서 그런가 (이 책이 처음 나왔을 때- 원서 출판년도 1999, 번역본 출판년도 2003년 -는 큰 반향을 일으켰겠지만 올해는 새로운 pandemic flu가 최고조를 이루고 있다.) 아니면 번역이 조금 엉성해서 그런가, 뉴욕타임즈의 1999년 올해의 책이었던데다 이 책에 수여된 각종 찬사들에 비해서는 구성이 치밀하지 않다.
가장 실망했던 부분은 미국 정부의 대국민 예방 접종 챕터에서 그 큰 규모의 캠페인을 중단하게 한 결정적인 발견이 무엇이었는지 구체적으로 밝히지 않은 부분이다(232쪽). 한 과학자가 자다가 벌떡 일어나 떠오른 생각을 곧장 정부에 제출해 전국 규모의 캠페인이 결국 중단되기까지 했다면서 어떻게 그 부분을 전혀 설명하지 않았는지 이해할 수...more
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Kolata graduated from the University of Maryland and studied molecular biology at the graduate level at MIT for a year and a half. Then she returned to the University of Maryland and obtained a master’s degree in applied mathematics. Kolata has taught writing as a visiting professor at Princeton University and frequently gives lectures across the country. She lives in Princeton, New Jersey, with h...more
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Mar 16, 2009 09:14am
Jan 12, 2013 04:53pm