jeannamarie's review
5.0
Interesting. Very scary. Thought provoking. If you read this, you would never not follow CDC guidelines in a pandemic, but this book makes the 2019-2020 covid pandemic look minuscule compared to the 1918 pandemic. Well researched piece of text.
Highly recommend.
Highly recommend.
seeker42's review against another edition
5.0
An exhaustively researched and expertly crafted full account of The Great Influenza of 1918-1920. It is also one that presents the reader with the truly terrifying ramifications of what an outbreak of a particularly, and entirely random, strain of the virus behind what many dismiss these days as merely “the sniffles”. You will likely not neglect to get your annual flu shots ever again. COVID-19 has nothing on influenza, that much is certain.
darthvargas's review against another edition
dark
emotional
informative
mysterious
reflective
sad
fast-paced
4.25
bri_noyes1's review
5.0
I hardly ever leave reviews- and a big part of me hesitates because I fear I won't do this book justice. But it has been fascinating to read this book and compare it to what the world us currently facing with the Coronavirus pandemic. This book was originally published and 2004- well before what we are going through now. What we are going through right now is very hard to sift through because things are so politicized on both sides of the aisle. I was grateful to be able to compare it to another pandemic with history's hindsight - that was written well before this pandemic. This way I could see my own comparisons and draw my own conclusions about what we are facing.
I think as a society we forgot about this huge pandemic that happened a century ago.. Yes we know about it- but we don't really KNOW about it. We forgot how how horrible it was. How young the modern medical field really was- they were just beginning in the scientific method from medieval practices. How significantly many of the doctors and nurses were out serving in WWI. How they, too, had to quarantine, and wear masks. We forgot about the sacrifices the made and the millions of lives lost. How does the human mind even comprehend how much loss the people experienced during this time.
The author even notes that this pandemic did not leave a huge cultural mark despite how incomprehensibly devastating it was. And I think that was a missed opportunity for us to learn from them- not only on what we should do in the future to prepare for a (very) likely pandemic, but in how to make the sacrifices and support people and systems that are put in impossible positions to help us get through a pandemic with the least amount of casualties.
I also think as a society we got complacent about our medical system. We have great technology and brilliant minds that has the potential to help save us- but it cannot if it's overwhelmed. It cannot if industries that the medical system are reliant on for supplies are shut down because of sick workers.
I loved the medical history scattered throughout this and, again, especially appreciated being able to draw the comparisons to Covid.
I think as a society we forgot about this huge pandemic that happened a century ago.. Yes we know about it- but we don't really KNOW about it. We forgot how how horrible it was. How young the modern medical field really was- they were just beginning in the scientific method from medieval practices. How significantly many of the doctors and nurses were out serving in WWI. How they, too, had to quarantine, and wear masks. We forgot about the sacrifices the made and the millions of lives lost. How does the human mind even comprehend how much loss the people experienced during this time.
The author even notes that this pandemic did not leave a huge cultural mark despite how incomprehensibly devastating it was. And I think that was a missed opportunity for us to learn from them- not only on what we should do in the future to prepare for a (very) likely pandemic, but in how to make the sacrifices and support people and systems that are put in impossible positions to help us get through a pandemic with the least amount of casualties.
I also think as a society we got complacent about our medical system. We have great technology and brilliant minds that has the potential to help save us- but it cannot if it's overwhelmed. It cannot if industries that the medical system are reliant on for supplies are shut down because of sick workers.
I loved the medical history scattered throughout this and, again, especially appreciated being able to draw the comparisons to Covid.
michelleboydwaters's review
5.0
The Great Influenza not only analyzes how our country responded to the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic, but also interprets how efforts of leading scientists to build a world-class medical system leading up to the early 20th century created the conditions in which our country experienced and responded to that pandemic. The book, originally published in 2004 and with new afterwards published in 2009 and 2018, also sheds light on how we've prepared for our current pandemic and demonstrates how our current leaders' responses echo what happened in the past.
rlk7m's review
4.0
So many times I didn’t know if I was reading about the 1918 flu pandemic or COVID-19. This is an important, worthy read, even if some parts were a bit of a slog. I can’t imagine what an updated afterward will say in a year or two.
juliana_aldous's review
5.0
This book made it clear to me that the seemingly draconian steps our local and state governments are taking are the right ones.
Here are the last couple of paragraphs from the 10th Anniversary edition:
"So the final lesson of 1918, a simple one yet most difficult to execute, is that those who occupy positions of authority must lessen the panic that can alienate all within a society. Society can not function if it is every man for himself. By definition, civilization cannot survive that.
Those in authority must retain the public's trust. The way to do that is to distort nothing, to put the best face on nothing, to try and manipulate no one. Lincoln said it first, and best.
A leader must make whatever horror exists concrete. Only then will people be able to break it apart."
It was interesting to go back and read this book with a global pandemic unfolding. My brother recommended this book to me several years ago. I read it and it is one that will stick with you. It is a concise story about the changing of medical science in the late 19th to 20th century. It is a book that profiles some of the greatest scientists of that time as well as how and why schools like John Hopkins were founded.
And then there is the horror in the book. The unfolding of the influenza outbreak that ravaged through army encampments, ships, cities, and countries. It is the descriptions of the sick and how they died--in many cases quickly and how completely overwhelmed systems can be. The descriptions of seemingly healthy people collapsing dead on the street, or turning blue on a makeshift hospital cot, or the horror of corpses being kept in houses or put out on the porch. And then the orphans--children with no parents left. Of how systems like Red Cross were overwhelmed trying to find nurses and volunteers to help. (This is the one that got me-how are we mobilizing now?) How the epidemic ebbed and flowed across the globe and spread quickly because of WWI.
I thought about that last one a lot since reading this. During WWI we shipped people back and forth across the country and the world and back again. That was a different time. This current pandemic has shown us how small our world has become. We are global and mobile. When they announced in New York that they were putting a one-mile "containment" area around Westchester--my first thought was, when was the last time I personally stayed put in a one-mile radius of where I lived? I regularly pass up and down the 405 where the center of Washington's epicenter sits.
After reading this I also have a better understanding of terms like ARDs and the book does touch on coronaviruses like SARs and how they work. I also learned more about vaccines and treatments and how and why they work. And now I know a lot more about pneumonia and how it kills.
If this book might scare you too much and heighten your anxiety, maybe don't read it. But do read it if you want a roadmap to get through this time. It has good lessons on how things can go right and how they can go wrong. Any extra time you can use now to learn and grow your knowledge is time well spent. No time to read it? Here is a link to John M. Barry talking about the book on C-Span. https://www.c-span.org/video/?182014-2/the-great-influenza
Please someone give a copy of this to Jared Kushner.
Here are the last couple of paragraphs from the 10th Anniversary edition:
"So the final lesson of 1918, a simple one yet most difficult to execute, is that those who occupy positions of authority must lessen the panic that can alienate all within a society. Society can not function if it is every man for himself. By definition, civilization cannot survive that.
Those in authority must retain the public's trust. The way to do that is to distort nothing, to put the best face on nothing, to try and manipulate no one. Lincoln said it first, and best.
A leader must make whatever horror exists concrete. Only then will people be able to break it apart."
It was interesting to go back and read this book with a global pandemic unfolding. My brother recommended this book to me several years ago. I read it and it is one that will stick with you. It is a concise story about the changing of medical science in the late 19th to 20th century. It is a book that profiles some of the greatest scientists of that time as well as how and why schools like John Hopkins were founded.
And then there is the horror in the book. The unfolding of the influenza outbreak that ravaged through army encampments, ships, cities, and countries. It is the descriptions of the sick and how they died--in many cases quickly and how completely overwhelmed systems can be. The descriptions of seemingly healthy people collapsing dead on the street, or turning blue on a makeshift hospital cot, or the horror of corpses being kept in houses or put out on the porch. And then the orphans--children with no parents left. Of how systems like Red Cross were overwhelmed trying to find nurses and volunteers to help. (This is the one that got me-how are we mobilizing now?) How the epidemic ebbed and flowed across the globe and spread quickly because of WWI.
I thought about that last one a lot since reading this. During WWI we shipped people back and forth across the country and the world and back again. That was a different time. This current pandemic has shown us how small our world has become. We are global and mobile. When they announced in New York that they were putting a one-mile "containment" area around Westchester--my first thought was, when was the last time I personally stayed put in a one-mile radius of where I lived? I regularly pass up and down the 405 where the center of Washington's epicenter sits.
After reading this I also have a better understanding of terms like ARDs and the book does touch on coronaviruses like SARs and how they work. I also learned more about vaccines and treatments and how and why they work. And now I know a lot more about pneumonia and how it kills.
If this book might scare you too much and heighten your anxiety, maybe don't read it. But do read it if you want a roadmap to get through this time. It has good lessons on how things can go right and how they can go wrong. Any extra time you can use now to learn and grow your knowledge is time well spent. No time to read it? Here is a link to John M. Barry talking about the book on C-Span. https://www.c-span.org/video/?182014-2/the-great-influenza
Please someone give a copy of this to Jared Kushner.
emcheym's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
sad
slow-paced
4.75