Epidemic

DK Eyewitness Books

by Brian R. Ward

Featuring an extra-sturdy library binding!

For as along as people have lived together in communities, infectious disease has been a part of everyday life. The fascinating story of disease-causing microbes, bacteria, and viruses crosses every area of human existence -- from medicine, social history, and geography to art and natural history. This unique guide takes you on a compelling journey through time and into the future -- from the plagues of the Ancient Egyptians to the laboratories of the twenty-first century. Stunning, three-dimensional models of disease-causing agents and superb electron-microscope images reveal this microscopic and dramatic world in incredible detail. Written by science and medical expert Brian Ward and produced in association with The American Museum of Natural History, Epidemic is one of the few in-depth explorations of this extraordinary subject for the ordinary reader.

Genres: Science, Medical

64 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 2000

Reviews

[Benjamin Fasching-Gray · Rating 4 out of 5]

I actually read the German edition. DK’s “Eyewitness Guides” are called “Sehen Staunen Wissen.” This book is from 2000, but even after 20 years the most important information hasn’t changed. What strikes me as the most important lesson here is that people keep cutting down forests, and coming into contact with viruses that are new to humans, forcing animals to move and carry their diseases with them. The point is made several times here. Climate change is not addressed, although the big meeting in Kyoto had already made global warming famous the world over. The book mentions how floods, migration, and habitat changes can lead to epidemics but that climate change will cause that to happen more often is left unsaid.

Since this book we’ve had several coronavirus epidemics and the current pandemic, zika virus, and it looks like swine and bird flu are both endemic now. With Bolsonaro and Modi cutting down forests, can the next pandemic be far behind? Will it be something more like Hanta virus or Ebola? Instead of whining about lockdowns, masks, and vaccine side-effects we should be demanding a stop to the environmental destruction and factory farming. That it’s the same ideology behind the destruction as lies behind the lack of international cooperation and the profit instead of health goals of our vaccination production and distribution should be obvious.

Also: read more Kindersachbuecher. DK: bring back the eyewitness guides, they were the bomb. Ben out.