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The Viral Storm: The Dawn Of A New Pandemic Age (2011)

by Nathan Wolfe(Favorite Author)

3.69 of 5 Votes: 2

ISBN

0805091947 (ISBN13: 9780805091946)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Times Books

review 1: Near the end of this book, published in 2011, the author calls for Risk literacy when it comes to pandemics. Now in 2014 we are witnessing an alarming lack of this quality among decision makers and the public when it comes to the Ebola scare. This book could go a long way towards developing pandemic risk literacy in those who choose to read it. Despite some of the other reviewers' comments regarding the lack of in-depth treatment, the book's formulaic structure, and the author's tendency to think too highly of himself and his close colleagues, I found this to be n informative, up to date, treatment of an important topic of great current relevance. There is an extensive bibliography for those (and this probably should be all of us) who want more detail. The book is wel... morel worth the time to read it for those who want to be able to speak and act intelligently regarding HIV, H1N1, HPV, anthrax, and Ebola, as well as the major role of microbes in the Earth's web of life.
review 2: By turns frightening and then hopeful, The Viral Storm offers a helpful, timely, and readable lesson in the first viral hits. The author is a primatologist turned virologist who has spent years in hot zones in Asia and Central Africa documenting how viruses emerge from humans with intimate contact with wild animals through killing and butchering "bush meat." He leads the reader through virus from the beneficial and gentle to the profoundly frightening hemorrhagic fevers (like Ebola) in explaining what viruses are and how the are transmitted. Along the way he describes why more deadly viruses should be expected.Wolfe concludes by describing work with the canaries in the coal mine--bush meat hunters, airline attendants, and those receiving regular blood transfusions--and how tracking these and other sentinel groups can combine with social media data and serious data mining to stop new viruses with pandemic potential before they go viral.This worthwhile read separates the fact from the hype and offers what we can do on the broad scale and what each individual can do to minimize the spread of deadly viruses. less

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