Noemi Lopez
Plagues & Poxes: The Impact of Human History on Epidemic Disease. Alfred Jay Bollet, M.D. New York: Demos Medical Publishing, Inc. 2004. 237 pages.
Disease has been present throughout history in people’s lives, which is why it has become such an important topic worldwide in various academic fields. Alfred Jay Bollet, the author of the book “Plagues and Poxes: The Impact of Human History on Epidemic Disease”, talks about the history of major outbreaks of both infectious and noninfectious disease. The point that the author makes is very clear from the beginning of the book. His point is that human actions and behaviors are the ones that have caused major diseases or plagues to spread unmistakably as a form of globalization. There are many points of view of the origin of disease. However, the author insists that disease is the outcome of historical events, mainly being the result of human actions which in turn have shaped history itself. The author’s point is well supported throughout the book of how disease being present for centuries in people’s lives has affected them conspicuously.
Alfred Jay Bollet is a very distinguished academic rheumatologist, and has also chaired two different departments of medicine at two medical schools, as well a Professor in Clinical Medicine at Yale University. He has the expertise and knowledge in historical diseases that have affected so many people and drawn different future paths to communities at times because of how plagues shaped their lives and other outcomes that would not have existed otherwise. The author’s knowledge and interest in history of disease has been awakened even more as a result of the strong wave of events of disease that have arisen. His experience on history of disease if notable in his multiple publications, one of better connectedness to this particular work; there is a previous edition worth of paying close attention to. The previous edition is very different to the new one. Some changes were made to this new edition, in comparison to the edition published in 1987 which concentrated on the occurrence and weakening of specific diseases and their impact on world history. The new version seems to be more realistic to current happenings; what we have learned from the past, new findings of old diseases, old diseases reappearing in the present, and new diseases that have come up as a result of human actions, the one most highlighted by the author are eating habits, etc. At the same time, the new edition dedicates six new meaningful chapters that puts us to date which new diseases have appeared and why. At the same time, besides from bringing his previous work to date; it also has a more realistic, optimistic, and encouraging title.
“Plagues and Poxes: The Impact of Human History on Epidemic Disease” is undoubtedly a great collection of essays where the author talks about the impact of human history on epidemic disease and emphasizes on various kinds of infectious and noninfectious diseases which show how there have been rise and changing of disease patterns throughout history. The author does a great job when he talks of key events which are starting points of devastating diseases, people that got involved, and talks about how those diseases where controlled by using different measurements and techniques, such as the most antique and effective one which was quarantine and later on more sophisticated ones such a inoculation and/or vaccination.
The book is meant to be for various audiences from different academic backgrounds. That is why it is such an easy read; uses few anatomical terms and could be said that is very much historical than medical. In other words, it is still a medical book but can reach many other addressees that are not specifically medical professionals.
The book is well written and brings readers to a historical timeline of diseases which teaches thoroughly of important records of how plagues came to exist, how they affected communities first and later on societies, countries or even regions around the world. The author starts the book with the first chapter on Infectious Diseases: Bubonic Plague. Bubonic Plague is a disease that has caught the attention of many and been in long chapters on history books. Alfred Jay Bollet goes back and does an incredible job at explaining its history in so much detail. He even goes on to tell that it was first called “the great death” in the 14th century, then it was called the “black death” until the 16th century in Scandinavia and later on the name was also adopted in England in the 17th century. Similarly, the author makes this book his own by putting so in depth information, as well as individualized information such as the ones of Former President Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
The first chapter on Infectious Diseases: Bubonic Plague sets up the perfect stage for readers to understand how diseases come to exist and later on how they spread and get to the degree of being epidemics and even pandemics. The author makes his point clear from the first chapter in the book and sets the stage for the chapters to come. The author explains: “Although primarily a disease of rats and other small mammals, and the fleas, bubonic plague is spread from place to place by human commerce and travel, and excellent route for the migration of the animal vectors of disease” (17). It is clear that it is the result of human action that epidemics propagate in different directions and how outbreaks behave. Alfred Jay Bollet, again re-states the point that he wants to make clear of how will continue to talk about disease throughout the book conveying it once more by saying, “The history of the Black Death and how it was spread is a model for the spread of many major epidemic diseases, since bubonic plague goes where travelers go” (19).
In conclusion, “Plagues and Poxes” is such an interesting book because it talks about historical events in a social analysis which is on the impact of different diseases on various populations around the world and how human activity and behavior has been the main one of the causes of how they have been propagated. The author does a great job on this report on diseases that have turned into epidemics in human populations.
