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Sonia Shah

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The Fever: How Malaria Has Ruled Humankind for 500,000 Years 1st Edition, Kindle Edition

by Sonia Shah (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

4.5 292 ratings

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In recent years, malaria has emerged as a cause célèbre for voguish philanthropists. Bill Gates, Bono, and Laura Bush are only a few of the personalities who have lent their names—and opened their pocketbooks—in hopes of curing the disease. Still, in a time when every emergent disease inspires waves of panic, why aren't we doing more to eradicate one of our oldest foes? And how does a parasitic disease that we've known how to prevent for more than a century still infect 500 million people every year, killing nearly 1 million of them?

In The Fever, the journalist Sonia Shah sets out to answer these questions, delivering a timely, inquisitive chronicle of the illness and its influence on human lives. Through the centuries, she finds, we've invested our hopes in a panoply of drugs and technologies, and invariably those hopes have been dashed. From the settling of the New World to the construction of the Panama Canal, through wars and the advances of the Industrial Revolution, Shah tracks malaria's jagged ascent and the tragedies in its wake, revealing a parasite every bit as persistent as the insects that carry it. With distinguished prose and original reporting from Panama, Malawi, Cameroon, India, and elsewhere, The Fever captures the curiously fascinating, devastating history of this long-standing thorn in the side of humanity.

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978-0374230012
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1st
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On Kindle Scribe
Publisher

Sarah Crichton Books
Publication date

June 29, 2010
Language

English
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2199 KB
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This fascinating, mordant pop-sci account tells us why malaria is one of the world™s greatest scourges, killing a million people every year and debilitating another 300 million, and why we have remained complacent about it. Journalist Shah (The Body Hunters: Testing New Drugs in the World™s Poorest Patients) shows how the Plasmodium parasite, entering through a mosquito™s bite and feasting on human red blood cells, has altered human history by destroying armies, undermining empires, and driving changes in our very genome. We™ve learned to fight back with antimalarial drugs and insecticides, but malaria™s adaptability and its buzzing vector, Shah notes, give it the upper hand. Shah provides an intricate and lucid rundown of the biology and ecology of malaria, but her most original insights concern the ways in which human society accommodates and abets the parasite. (The impoverished denizens of Africa™s malaria belt, she observes, would sometimes rather use the pesticide-laced bed nets sent by Western aid groups to catch fish.) Shah™s is an absorbing account of human ingenuity and progress, and of their heartbreaking limitations. 16 pages of b&w illus.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Investigative journalist Shah maintains her signature pattern (Crude, 2004; The Body Hunters, 2006) here, exposing both the seemly and not-so-seemly aspects of the subject under review. As Shah demonstrates, when it comes to taming, never mind eradicating, malaria, the disease is cannily able to keep the ball in humankind's court. Notwithstanding, people in tropical climes who live with its ubiquitous presence have over time come to uneasy terms with the fever. That is not to say they would not benefit from a cure. Indeed, their need is most critical. It's just that when Western nontropical humans are exposed to malaria, they suffer its worst effects, then tackle the problem in largely ineffectual ways. And it is not for want of money (think Bill and Melinda Gates). But Shah takes no prisoners, blasting everyone, including the World Health Organization. Even Harvard's state-of-the art Malaria Initiative takes it on the chin for eschewing unglamorous but effectual grunt work in favor of “lavishly funded . . . economy building technology.” Malaria may rule humankind, but Shah rules the in-depth investigative report. --Donna Chavez

Review

“The Fever is a vivid and compelling history with a message that’s entirely relevant today.” —Elizabeth Kolbert, author of Field Notes from a Catastrophe: Man, Nature, and Climate Change

“I didn’t just read The Fever—I inhaled it. It’s a fascinating book, elegantly written and superbly well researched: a poignant and important reminder of malaria’s relentless human toll.” —Nina Munk, author of Fools Rush In: Steve Case, Jerry Levin, and the Unmaking of AOL Time Warner

“A thrilling detective story, spanning centuries, about our erratic pursuit of a villain still at large and still a threat to mankind. The Fever is rich in colorful detail and engagingly told. An astonishing array of characters has joined the fray, and you can only be amazed at the deviousness and skill of the archenemy.” —Malcolm Molyneux, Professor, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine

“Extremely well-researched, The Fever provides a highly gripping account of one of mankind’s worst diseases. Highly recommended.” —Bart Knols, malariologist and managing director, MalariaWorld.org

About the Author

Sonia Shah is a science journalist and author of the prize-winning The Body Hunters: Testing New Drugs on the World's Poorest Patients, named one of the best consumer health books of 2006 by Library Journal, and Crude: the Story of Oil. A former writing fellow of The Nation Institute and the Puffin Foundation, her writing has appeared in The Lancet, The Nation, New Scientist and elsewhere.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The view through the mosquito net is blurry, but I can see the

thick skin of grime on the leading edge of each blade of the

ceiling fan as it slowly whirs around, keening alarmingly.

This is how it was every summer when I visited my grandmother’s

house in southern India. While my cousins snore on the bed mats

laid across the floor beside me, glistening bodies bathed in the warm

night breeze, my sleeping mat is ensconced in a hot, gauzy cage. The

mosquitoes descend from the darkened corners of the whitewashed

room and perch menacingly on the taut netting, ready to exploit any

fl icker of movement from their prey within. It is hard to fall asleep

knowing they are there, watching me, but eventually I drop off and

my tensed body uncurls. They sneak into the gaps my protruding

limbs create, and feast.

In the morning, all my hard work of trying to fi t in, to overcome

the Americanness of my suburban New England life, has been

undone, for my Indian cousins are smooth and brown while I am

speckled with bleeding scabs. My grandmother vigorously pats talcum

powder over my wounds, the white powder caking pink with

congealed blood, as my cousins snicker. I don’t understand how they

escape unscathed while I am tormented. But incomprehension is part

of the package of these childhood summers in India. Just outside my

grandmother’s house ragged families huddle in rubble along the road

and use the train tracks as their toilet. They wave their sticklike arms

in my face and moan woefully when we pass by on the way to temple,

caricatures of beggars. One boy’s leg has swollen to the size of a log,

and is gray and pimpled, from some disease brought on by a mosquito

bite. My grandmother tightens her grip on my hand. We give

the children nothing. I can’t understand this, either. When we get to

the white marble temple, it is full of incense and golden statues

encrusted with diamonds and rubies—to my seven-year-old mind,

the very picture of prosperity.

Part of me despises my estrangement, my incomprehension, the

fact that I must sleep under the suffocating net and take the malaria

pills while my cousins don’t. But part of me is secretly glad. The boy

with the swollen leg frightens me. The family who lives on the curb

frightens me. India frightens me. These fears, for the girl who is supposed

to be Indian but isn’t, are unspeakable.

When no one is looking, I crush the mosquitoes’ poised little

figures with my palm and smear the remains on a hidden seam in

the couch. Our Jain religion forbids violence of any kind. No eating

meat. No swatting flies. My grandmother wears a mask over her

mouth while she prays, to protect airborne microbes from inadvertent

annihilation in her inhalations, and considers walking on

blades of grass a sin. Meanwhile, there I am in the corner, cravenly

pulverizing mosquito corpses behind my back, blood literally on

my hands.

Back home in New England, the mosquitoes still bite, but there

are no nets at night, no pills to take, no scary beggars on the side of

the road. We shop for forgettable plastic trinkets at the mall. My fear

and loathing of the mosquito are blunted into games of tag. My father

calls himself Giant Mosquito, undulates his fingers like proboscises

and chases me and my sister. It’s scary, but fun-scary. We screech

with glee and stampede through the house.

• • •

Thirty years later, on the S-shaped land bridge between the North

and South American continents, I meet José Calzada. Calzada is a

mosquito stalker of sorts, and I, the mosquito hater, have come to

learn about the local mosquitoes and their exploits. A parasitologist

from Panama City, Panama, Calzada spends his time rushing to the

scene of disease outbreaks across the isthmus. The mosquito-borne

parasite that causes malaria, Plasmodium, is one of his specialties.

It is April 2006. For most of the past century, there hasn’t been

much work in this fi eld for people such as Calzada. Panama prides

itself on being one of just a handful of tropical developing countries

to have tamed its mosquitoes and nearly conquered malaria. American

military engineers built a canal through Panama in the early

1900s, and forced malaria to retreat to the remote fringes of the

country. Since then it has stagnated, primarily in its most benign

incarnation, vivax malaria, which is rarely fatal.

But things have changed in recent years, and Calzada has agreed

to show me some obscure signs. He emerges from the imposing

Gorgas Memorial Institute, Panama’s sole health research center.

Clean-shaven and trim, Calzada has a slightly worried look in his

eyes that is off set by high cheekbones suggesting a perpetual halfsmile.

I wait while he meticulously changes out of his work clothes—

button-down oxford shirt and slacks—and into a T-shirt and jeans.

Climbing into my diminutive white rental car and tossing a baseball

cap on top of his backpack in the backseat, he patiently directs me

out of the labyrinthine metropolis. Navigating Panama City’s congested

streets, past shiny skyscrapers and packed cafés, is a task that

challenges even my well-honed Boston driv ing skills.

After twenty minutes heading east out of the city, the road turns

quiet. It’s a lovely drive, with hills in the distance, verdant pasture

and scrub unbroken save for a few elaborately gated houses set far

back from the road. Colombian drug lords, Calzada says, by way of

explanation. Another hour passes, and the road rises, a glittering

lake coming into view, just visible through a tangle of jungle. As we

near the water, the pavement ends, and we pull over.

Here, at the end of the road, is the town of Chepo. From what I

can see, it consists of a wooden lean-to facing a sleepy roadside café.

Two police officers amble out of the lean-to, which turns out to be a

checkpoint. They take my passport and vanish, leaving Calzada and

me to buy a cold drink at the near-empty café. As we sit, I can just

make them out in the murk within the lean-to, inspecting the blue

passport with great care, turning it over and over in their hands as if

for clues to some baffling mystery.

Inspection completed, Calzada leads us on foot behind the road.

Th e hillside is green and lush, with a slick red clay track leading to

the crest. He heads up and I follow gingerly.

At the top of the hill lies an improb able settlement. Packed

together, not ten feet apart, are dozens of hand-built ranchos, their

thatched roofs sitting on top of roughly hewn wooden poles. More

arbor than hut, some of the structures rest on concrete slabs, with

airy wooden-slat walls on three sides, but most are fully open-air,

situated directly on the packed dirt. Inside the ranchos, smoldering

fi res are encircled by battered metal cooking vats, parrots sit on overturned

baskets, and hammocks sway from high rafters.

From the road, Chepo seems abandoned, but in fact, three hundred

of Panama’s indigenous Kuna people live here, tucked away.

It starts to rain, and we duck under the eaves of a rancho. Women

pass to and fro in bright puff ed-sleeve cotton blouses with patterned

molas tied around their waists and elaborate beaded anklets that

reach up to their calves. They are cutting plantains, carrying plump

naked children. One puts out a giant metal vat to collect the rainwater

sliding off the thatch. A rooster strides by purposefully.

A half-dozen boys clad in saggy cotton underwear and wearing

shell necklaces happily kick a defl ated green soccer ball. One boy,

around eight years old and wearing cracked red plastic flip-flops,

gnaws on a green mango pit while absentmindedly pulling on his

penis. A little girl walks by holding a baby covered in a rash, whom

she hands to me easily. It is a tranquil scene, earthy and ripe, this

hidden place at the end of the road.

It is soon apparent that most of the residents are in one of the

larger ranchos, sitting around a smoky fire. Peeking in, we see them

singing softly and dancing. A few are sprawled on the clay floor,

facedown, passed out. We’ve arrived in the midst of a fiesta, Calzada

whispers to me. A local girl has recently menstruated for the fi rst

time, and so the community has spent the day drinking chicha fuerte,

a brew made from fermented corn. As we watch, a woman and a

boy lift a comatose mud-caked man off the ground and drag him

home. Two women from inside the rancho follow them to the doorway,

smiling. Aside from a few furtive looks, they ignore us almost

entirely.

It wasn’t like this the year before, when Calzada first came here.

There is no En glish-language record of what happened to Chepo’s

Kuna community in 2005, save the one you are reading now. The

mosquitoes that hatched from Chepo’s stagnant puddles, the edges

of the lake below, in the open-water cisterns, had gone on a rampage.

Contaminated with the most malevolent malaria parasites known to

humankind in their spittle, they alit on the exposed and unclad Kuna

around them. By the time Calzada and his team arrived, nearly half

of the settlement was fevered, terrified, immobilized in their hammocks. ...

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B003R0LBT4
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Sarah Crichton Books; 1st edition (June 29, 2010)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ June 29, 2010
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 2199 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 319 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #858,872 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #62 in Microbiology (Kindle Store)
- #146 in Communicable Diseases (Kindle Store)
- #290 in Medical History

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4.5 292 ratings

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Sonia Shah

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Sonia Shah is a science journalist and prize-winning author. Her writing on science, politics, and human rights has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Foreign Affairs, Scientific American and elsewhere. Her work has been featured on RadioLab, Fresh Air, and TED, where her talk, "Three Reasons We Still Haven't Gotten Rid of Malaria" has been viewed by over 1,000,000 people around the world. Her 2010 book, The Fever, which was called a "tour-de-force history of malaria" (New York Times), "rollicking" (Time), and "brilliant" (Wall Street Journal) was long-listed for the Royal Society's Winton Prize. Her new book, Pandemic: Tracking Contagions from Cholera to Ebola and Beyond, is forthcoming from Sarah Crichton Books/Farrar, Straus & Giroux in February 2016.

Her prize-winning 2006 drug industry exposé, The Body Hunters: Testing New Drugs on the World's Poorest Patients (New Press), has been hailed by Publishers Weekly as "a tautly argued study...a trenchant exposé...meticulously researched and packed with documentary evidence," and as "important [and] powerful" by The New England Journal of Medicine. The book, which international bestselling novelist and The Constant Gardener author John Le Carré called "an act of courage," has enjoyed wide international distribution, including French, Japanese, and Italian editions. The Library Journal named it one of the best consumer health books of 2006.

Shah was born in 1969 in New York City to Indian immigrants. Growing up, she shuttled between the northeastern United States where her parents practiced medicine and Mumbai and Bangalore, India, where her extended working-class family lived, developing a life-long interest in inequality between and within societies. She holds a BA in journalism, philosophy, and neuroscience from Oberlin College, and lives with molecular ecologist Mark Bulmer and their two sons Zakir and Kush.

Photo by Joyce Ravid.

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Frederick S. Goethel

A Wake Up Call to Americans About the Dangers of Malarial Infection

Reviewed in the United States on July 21, 2010

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The author begins the book with a look at how malaria developed and how the transmission cycle occurs in the Anopheles mosquito. Tracing it roots in Africa thousands of years ago, the author follows malarias spread around the world and explains why it is endemic in some areas while rarely found in others. She also delves into the issues of eradication and why it has failed to control, let alone conquer, the spread of the disease. From spraying to medications to netting, the author details why each has failed and how the malarial parasite has managed to survive most attempts to control it.

Most Americans rarely, if ever, think about malaria, and if they do, they think about it as it relates to poor African and South American countries which have not been able to eradicate malaria. I doubt many Americans are aware that we are precariously close to having malaria return to this country. Most mosquito experts will admit that we are potentially one infected person away from having malaria return to this country, and with globalization and easy travel available, it is inevitable that we will develop pockets of malaria. It really is just a matter of time.

The book is very well written, translating difficult technical information into very readable material that does not require scientific training to understand. As a board member of a mosquito control district, I am quite aware of how difficult it is to transmit readable, understandable information to the public, and the author has done an amazing job of doing just that. It should act as a wake up call to Americans about the dangers of malaria and why we need to be vigilant. I would recommend it to all, specifically those people living in areas where malaria is most likely to return.

12 people found this helpful

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Donald

A Thorough Account

Reviewed in the United States on November 25, 2019

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The Fever is about the history of malaria. Malaria is an ancient disease. Although it was identified in 1880, author Sonia Shah traces it from Roman times. Today we understand much about this disease, but getting to this point has been arduous. First, malaria is caused not by a virus or bacteria, but by a one-celled parasite, the Plasmodium. Five species of Plasmodium infect humans, of which the Plasmodium falciparum is the most serious.

This parasite undergoes development in both mosquito and human through eight life stages. These transformations make it harder to detect. Scientists also struggled to discover how it spread. After the mosquito was suspected as the vector, and the Anopheles genus was discovered as the carrier, it was found that certain species of Anopheles carried different types of malaria, while a majority carried none. Additionally, carrier species were found in different parts of the world. So, while Anopheles subpictus might be a major malaria carrier in parts of India, Anopheles gambiae could be a major carrier in sub-Saharan Africa.

Finding an effective medicine was a struggle. Quinine at one time was preferred. But when it was most needed during WW II, the Cinchona tree grew mostly within conquered Japanese territory. Several synthetic substitutes gave false hopes when their effectiveness waned with the parasite’s growing immunity.

Even after an effective remedy was found, human nature found a way to squander it through mismanagement and indifference. Today, geography, ecology, and economics conspire to prolong malaria’s existence. Humans find out repeatedly that, while Asian and African natives find ways to coexist with the disease, foreigners with no immunity fall victim.

Efforts to eradicate malaria have failed. Malaria seems best checked by controlling its environment. Currently the scourge seems hidden from our view in the US. But it is still around, and most prevalent in the poorest countries where preventive measures are neglected.

Shah wrote a surprisingly comprehensive book. Her research is thorough. And it appeared that much of her research was first-hand. Her journalistic style, at times digressing but evocative, provides a respite from hard science; however, this might not be appreciated by all readers.

I also wondered if the place Shah gave malaria in shaping history is warranted. For example, although Roman campaigns frequently fell victim to sickness, malaria had many malevolent competitors.

2 people found this helpful

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EJ

A brilliant synthesis of a complicated subject

Reviewed in the United States on July 20, 2010

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Malaria is not something most of us think about in-depth unless traveling to an area where the disease is common. However, this incredible book makes an excellent argument for why we should. The author manages to magically transform volumes of scientific information into a riveting tale that just about anyone will enjoy.

Ms. Shah traces the very complex history of malaria from the beginning of human/mosquito interaction, and covers a range of related topics including the routes of infection and transmission; why certain areas and populations are more susceptible to malaria; the role of war, technology, and industry in sparking the disease; and why the efforts to control or at least contain it have not been universally successful. The book is meticulously sourced (at least 30% of the text consists of the references listed at the end of the book and footnoted within each chapter), but is not dry in the least.

The book reads like fiction, and it's too bad that it's not. The author leaves the reader with a very well-developed sense that the merest change in environmental conditions can leave us all susceptible to the next wave of malaria. I recommend this book strongly to just about anyone, but particularly for those who are interested in medical history and public health.

30 people found this helpful

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Bookworm

Malaria has ruled humanity for thousands of years. Why?

Reviewed in the United States on May 18, 2015

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The Fever presents an absolutely fascinating overview of how malaria and its effects on various groups of people have played a role in human history. You may wonder how this topic could be at all interesting, let alone fascinating. Sonia Shah manages to combine a personable and readable style with narratives that tie together wide-ranging events as connected with malaria, including as the fall of the Roman Empire and the slave trade in the Americas. I wish someone had given me this book to read when I was having my dry and meaningless history classes in high school!
This is like one of those epic historical novels, but with the malaria parasites as the main characters. For those who want to delve in in more detail, there are lots of references for every point; but the reading pleasure doesn't suffer from just reading past the scholarly references (which, I confess, I am doing).

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Bai

Comprehensive and readable history of a disease that shaped history

Reviewed in Canada on December 26, 2019

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History and science of malaria, a disease that has been around for 500,000 years and is still a problem today, even though many infectious diseases have been eradicated. Malaria is caused by a protozoan parasite that feeds on red blood cells, it's transmitted by mosquitos. After millennia of co-existence with humans, the parasite and our immune system have evolved many defenses and counter-defenses, for example: it hides in the liver to evade detection, and the sickle cell anemia gene provides defense against malaria.

Malaria has shaped history in many occasions: natives from malaria-endemic regions have acquired some degree of built-in immunity and rarely die from it, whereas white colonizers had no immunity and died frequently. This prevented white people from venturing deep into Africa, and a Scottish colony in Panama was doomed because everybody got sick. Conversely, human activity affects malaria as well -- malaria spreads when mosquitos have pools of stagnant water to lay their eggs. These conditions can be inadvertently created through land development, seasonality, climate change, etc.

Quinine (extracted from cinchona trees) was the first effective remedy for malaria, but supply was limited because it was difficult to grow. During WW2, synthetic quinacrine was developed, but the pathogens soon gained resistance. In the 70s, artemisinin was extracted from traditional Chinese medicine (one of the few success cases) but the parasite developed resistance to that as well, partially because Novartis made it too expensive and people used reduced doses, which leads to resistance. Currently the recommended treatment is artemisinin combination therapy, basically hitting it with a bunch of antimalarial drugs at the same time.

People in malaria-endemic countries often don't consider it a particularly serious disease, since 99% of the time you don't die from it, so public funding and interest is generally unstable. Still, it causes a lot of productivity loss as sick people are unable to work, one of the reasons for poverty. An effective counter is filling in ponds of stagnant water, which is how malaria was eradicated in the west; this is not feasible in tropical countries though. In the 50s, they attempted to use DDT to eradicate mosquitos; this was discontinued after birds were reported dying of DDT bioaccumulation. Still, many experts believe that DDT shouldn't have been banned since the benefits outweigh the costs.

What's next for malaria? The community is divided on whether complete eradication is a realistic goal; aiming long term control is more feasible. There will be no one-shot silver bullet solution, because in the past, every time the parasite soon develops resistance. Insecticide-treated mosquito nets are cost-effective, combined with medication and ecological reform, but it will be a long, slow battle.

Saptarshi

Must read for anyone interested in medical science❤️

Reviewed in India on December 17, 2020

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A treasure trove of knowledge on one of the deadliest diseases known to mankind

John

Interesting history of malaria

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 26, 2014

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This is worth a read. Sonia Shah provides a thought provoking overview of the history of this persistent disease and the terrible global toll it has caused,

hs　kondle

かゆい秋に考えよう

Reviewed in Japan on September 13, 2010

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30年前くらい前に寄生虫学の講義だったか、内科学の感染症の講義だったか、neglected diseaseといわれる、めったにない感染症にかかると、みたことのない若い医者は診断ができず、結局死にいたる。その外の大学からまねかれた講師は、あきれるくらい病原体がいるのにそれがわからないと我々に警告した。血液のsmearのなかにみられる青っぽいものはたしかに好中球の分葉核ではないのかというような像もある。これがマラリアである。
本書は、インド系のアメリカ人がいとこのいる、インドで蚊帳のなかで寝るところからはじまる。マラリアの伝達が蚊によるという発見の科学者間の争い、植民地化するときのマラリア対策（非対策）のいろいろなどがおもしろおかしく語られる。ローマ帝国が衰退していくころに、蚊のpopulation が変わって一気にマラリアの集団発生が各地に勃発したというところがおもしろかった。
マラリア原虫よりもAnophelesなんとかと多数でてくる蚊の研究に興味を覚える。ちょうど、九月は蚊が必死に差し出す頃で、この夏は猛暑で蚊の発生が少なく、秋にふえるのではないか（かゆい秋）という新聞記事がのっていた。また、Scienceの9月のはじめの号には、ビルマタイの国境付近でACT(ヨモギからとった抗マラリア薬とその仲間を組みあわせて用いて耐性の出現に対応する)治療にいそしむフランス人科学者や、あたらしい、抗マラリア薬を化学的アプローチで発見した報告などがのっている。Harvardのものすごいマラリアの研究所のことや、Big　pharma（Novartis）の戦略、偽薬の跋扈など、著者の得意とする分野であろう。
国連はなにを問題にすべきか。保健行政をなにに重点をおくべきかという議論はわれわれの知らないレベルで行われており、日本人のArata Kochiさんの話などの引用もあるし、現地のひとは、マラリア薬よりも、プラスチック製のバケツがほしいというといった現実の描写は納得がゆく。がんという病気だって、いずれはいまのマラリア蔓延地で重要になってくる問題であるが、expensive diseaseとして問題として全く認識されないという状況もよくわかる。
よみやすく、通読に向いた本である。

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Susan Eberth

Malaria

Reviewed in Canada on July 18, 2021

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A decent historical account of malaria. From the DDT devastation when this was used to battle the bug to the power of the Gates Foundation.

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The Fever: How Malaria Has Ruled Humankind for 500,000 Years 1st Edition, Kindle Edition

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