FLU - The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus That Caused It
Info
Author
Gina Kolata
Published
July 18, 2009
Purchase on Amazon.com
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A virus swept over the world during the winter of 1918,
and it attacked mostly the young and the healthy. Almost overnight, it
killed an estimated 40 million people. More American soldiers were
killed by this flu during that single winter than died during all of
World War II. Half a million died in the US, 19,000 in New York City
alone. And then, just as this killer arrived, it left.
It was an event that was so staggeringly horrible that history
literally forgot about it. And that's why you never learned about it in
school. This book is a murder mystery. It's as current as today's
newspaper because a small group of researchers have managed to find
that virus and they're working on breaking its genetic code as I write
these words. How they found it is one hell of a good story.
In 1976, the swine flu appeared on the scene and scientists thought it
was the return of the 1918 flu. The US Government made an attempt to
vaccinate every American. What happened as a result of this political
decision will help you to understand why so many people sue each other
nowadays.
I'd like you to read this book because, in 1918, the science of central
heating was relatively new. The engineers who were working on those
early systems had to deal with the panic that swept through the world
back then as a result of the winter of 1918. Those engineers had to
design heating systems that would heat buildings with the windows open.
This book is an eye-opening gem, one that will give you a greater
understanding of the heating trades, and the world of medicine - all at
the same time!
You will not be able to put it down.
