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A review by juliana_aldous
The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History by John M. Barry
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.