Reviews with content warning for Animal death - The Hot Zone

As someone who initially had little to no actual knowledge of ebola other than memories of pictures and news reports that spread in the 2000's when I was a child, I enjoyed the book as far as entertainment value goes. As an introduction it made me interested enough to research and seek out other sources on the topic. Unfortunately that was what ultimately led me to realising it has no more value than that.

The West African ebola epidemic hit communities on every structural level, targeting family who lovingly touched the sick, caregivers who cleaned bodily fluids, and mourners who washed their dead. At one point one of the followed 'characters' a doctor on the ground calls it the 'disease of love' spreading to people who simply long to provide their loved ones with dignity in death in accordance to their traditions. This is terrifying but also, in a way, profound- especially in relation to how such people are often described by outsiders as 'ignorant'. Is it fair to label them as such? At the time, mistrust and fear was rampant, many of the natives would experience their relatives becoming ill. There were cases of doctors taking patients for treatment and when they died the families were left in the dark, some began to believe Ebola was not real- or if it was the white man was infecting them with it purposefully and kidnapping their victims. In such circumstances, can you really blame them for clinging to their traditions all the more? For hiding the ill and being hostile to medical teams attempting to help them? It's a difficult and multifaceted issue, incredibly interesting. And barley addressed, swept aside in just a few lines to focus instead on gory symptoms Preston exaggerates to the point of obscenity. And this is a reoccurring problem in this book.

With further research I found that in reality you cannot catch Ebola unless the infected are showing symptoms and even then it is difficult, requiring certain conditions often tied to extreme poverty, and a lack of education and infrastructure (Hense why it is such a problem in more rural areas and the Congo in particular which is ravaged by genocide and war that we exacerbate through the buying of electronics) that is not present in the majority of Europe, had The Hot Zone been my only source I would never had known this. Preston wrote endless pages about an infected nurse who spent 2 days mixing and coming into contact with hundreds of people- likening it to a 'species threatening event' it is written in a way that gives the impression that its almost inevitable that Ebola will spread. Again further research told me this was not so and upon rereading and searching back and forth between those endless pages I realised that Preston had said this himself too. However, he did so at the very last possible moment in an almost hand wavy manner. 'She had shared a bottle of soda pop with someone, and not even that person became ill' a single line, written plainly and in the least attention catching way possible- almost as if he wanted people to miss that fact. To make it more 'exciting', drama over accuracy.

Ultimately I can understand why this book had such a cultural impact, its stripped down writing is accessible and gives a sense of building tension that catches the imagination. Im afraid however, it simply doesn't stick the landing. I wanted to be fully immersed (even despite my irritation at the constant exaggeration of symptoms- as if Ebola isn't scary enough in its natural state) but Preston repeatedly flies off into tangents about people's family pets or detailed steps of how they boiled chickens to use later in batch cooking or ENTIRE CHAPTERS dedicated to 'main characters' family members dying and every single time all I could think was how is this relevant? why would I care about this?

Overall I'd say its a worthwhile read if you have even the smallest amount of interest in diseases and the responses to them, if only because of how entrenched its become in the public consciousness. Keep in mind however, that it is quite dramatised and maybe read this article about its reception and the myths it generated: https://gizmodo.com/how-the-hot-zone-created-the-worst-myths-about-ebola-1649384576

Content Warnings

dreamofbookspines's review against another edition

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medium-paced

3.5

Gross enough that I probably won't read it again, but it was super interesting. My search history looks like hell after looking up a lot of the viral crises and areas Preston talks about. I read this initially around 1999 and remember as a kid (I was 13 or 14 that year) being terrified of ebola. Re-reading this certainly clarified why! I don't remember knowing it was nonfiction as a kid though...🤔

I was frustrated that Preston exaggerated what ebola does to the human body though. It does not liquify your insides. Yes, it has awful symptoms, but not that. Why go so nuts with a very real and terrifying disease? Also he used enough passive voice that I thought it worth noting.

Content Warnings