Viruses Plague And History Book Review

In two years between 1918 and 1919, A pandemic of influenza swept mercilessly over the planet, killing millions which stood in its path. Miraculously, the exact origin of the pandemic is unclear. What is exceedingly clear, however, is that often the actions of man aided in the spread of the virus, whether due to inadvertent endangerment, close quarters, religious principles, or failure to recognize the true threat that influenza posed.

The book “The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History, written by John M. Barry, covers the progression of the Spanish influenza, especially in the United States. Barry focuses not only on the influenza itself, though, but also on the social influences that allowed the virus to flourish. The book covers how medical practices in the United States had risen up just in time to combat the virus, but, due to societal issues and the war, the doctors struggled in areas where they should have been successful.

My baby tried corn for the first time. I roasted each ear ‘til the husk split, severed kernels with a bone blade, pulverized them between my teeth, soaked them in a white heifer’s cream. She nursed this golden food from my palm.

The drive and ambition to make an impact and change the usual sequence of events in life can greatly influence the desire to follow a particular path that leaves an indelible mark on the interactions with other people. Paul Offit’s literature piece, Vaccinated: One man's quest to defeat the world's deadliest diseases, brings out the transformations that a focused microbiologist (whose goal was to see the elimination of some of the natural ailments associated with children) can accomplish.

In the early 1900’s medicine was making some steps closer into some great improvements for health and better understanding of the human body. Doctors with sufficient knowledge of the human body and cures for diseases and viruses were scarce. People were much more concerned with government and politics, than health and medicine, until one of the greatest and most grotesque lethal pandemics that’s struck the earth in human history. This pandemic the “Spanish Flu” spread so rapidly and had an extremely high mortality rate. This was caused by the close contact of humans and poor cleanliness and sanitation, and the host (virus) and the body taking harsh action

As the second part of this reflection paper, I selected a book ‘A Short History of Disease’ by Sean Martin. He is a writer and filmmaker also known for his other famous books like The Knights Templar, Alchemy and alchemists, the Gnostics. His films include Lanterna Magicka: Bill Douglas & the secret history of cinema. The most alluring thing which conceives me to cull this book is a history of the disease, as a medical professional, it's always tantalizing to know from where all these begins and this book reaches up to my expectations as it started from the first ever recorded disease in the history of mankind. He isn’t lying when he say this a history of the disease. He starts from the earliest bacteria to evolve on the earth, long before there was anything around to infect. This book is divided into seven chapters, each chapter describes the history of diseases in a particular era. Chapter One: Prehistory, Chapter Two: Antiquity, Chapter Three: The Dark and Middle Ages, Chapter Four: The New World, Chapter

Although populations in ancient societies suffered attacks, invasions, starvation, and persecution, there was a more efficient killer that exterminated countless people. The most dreaded killers in the ancient world were disease, infections and epidemics. In many major wars the main peril was not gunfire, nor assault, but the easily communicable diseases that rapidly wiped out whole divisions of closely quartered soldiers. Until the time of Hippocrates, in the struggle between life and death, it was, more often than not, death that prevailed when a malady was involved. In the modern world, although illness is still a concern, advances in thought and technique have led to the highest birth rates in recorded history. No longer is a fever a

With lacking medical knowledge, people never really grasped the concept or the cause of this epidemic; therefore, they did not know what to do to help cure or stop the spread of it. “In spite of only sketchy medical knowledge, the epidemiology of the plague was fully understood by the 18th century. It took many years of research, after the fact, to finally comprehend all the ins

The book The Great Influenza by John Barry takes us back to arguably one of the greatest medical disasters in human history, the book focuses on the influenza pandemic which took place in the year 1918. The world was at war in the First World War and with everyone preoccupied with happenings in Europe and winning the war, the influenza pandemic struck when the human race was least ready and most distracted by happenings all over the world. In total the influenza pandemic killed over a hundred million people on a global scale, clearly more than most of the deadliest diseases in modern times. John Barry leaves little to imagination in his book as he gives a vivid description of the influenza pandemic of 1918 and exactly how this pandemic affected the human race. The book clearly outlines the human activities that more or less handed the human race to the influenza on a silver platter. “There was a war on, a war we had to win” (Barry, p.337). An element of focus in the book is the political happenings back at the time not only in the United States of America but also all over the world and how politicians playing politics set the way for perhaps the greatest pandemic in human history to massacre millions of people. The book also takes an evaluator look at the available medical installations and technological proficiencies and how the influenza pandemic has affected medicine all over the world.

“The single biggest threat to man’s continued dominance on the planet is the virus” Nobel Prize winner Joshua Lederberg once said. Throughout history, this statement has proved to be true. In fourteenth century Europe, the Bubonic Plague killed off almost half of the European population. During the first interactions between Columbus and the natives, Smallpox eradicated entire Native tribes. And in the time of the Industrial Revolution, cholera outbreaks have left millions dead. Since their outbreaks, many of these deadly viruses have been met with cures, saving millions of lives to come. However, for almost 3,500 years, one incurable virus had been attacking humanity: the poliovirus.1P

I. Introduction (Approximately 1min.) A. Attention Getter: Back in the 19th and 20th centuries there were a lot of horrifying diseases that infected people, mostly children and thousands of people died. People either recovered and developed natural immunity, or they died. Nowadays people have a third and much easier option: vaccinations.

Cady figured out that on Monday, the day before she was going to get killed, she was kidnapped and brought to her cabin because she, nor her parents would not tell the kidnappers where her parents kept the medication to cure Hantavirus. The most crucial objects in this book are: a gun that Cady used for protection, a napkin that saved

History has been marked by plagues of infectious diseases. From the devastating Black Death of Europe to deadly outbreaks of tuberculosis and smallpox in the United States, society has faced many battles with infectious diseases. However, with new technology and economic prosperity, many think of infectious diseases as an antiquated threat. This belief is far from true. Since the end of the 20th century, there has been a trend of emergence and re-emergence of infectious diseases all over the world. Over 30 new infectious diseases have emerged since the end of the 20th century and outbreaks of old and new diseases are rising (Weiss and McMichael 2004). Through analyzing six sources related to this topic, many factors contributing to this rise

2011’s Contagion portrays the issue of a worldwide disease pandemic, in which a newly discovered sickness begins to infect and kill massive amounts of the world’s total population. Not only does this movie show the difficulties of researching the microbe, but also the complex social issues that stem from attempting to contain the spread of the illness.

“Infectious diseases constitute a major problem for the world, but even more so in the developing world” (Fonkwo, 2008). Infectious diseases are caused by pathogenic microorganisms, such as bacteria, viruses, parasites or fungi; the diseases can be transmitted, directly or indirectly, from one person to another (WHO, 2015). No country can afford to remain distant in the war against these diseases, especially given the potentially far-reaching and devastating effects that they could have on the human race at large (Fonkwo, 2008). The threats posed by Infectious diseases globally are unequaled in terms of morbidity, mortality rate, transmission, fatality rate, and economic consequence dating back to the days of the bubonic plague. The bubonic plague and its co-infections: measles and smallpox were the most devastating of the infectious diseases and in 160 CE plague was reported by (Poole and Holladay, 1979) as cited by (Nelson and Williams, 2007) as a contributor to the collapse of the Han Empire.