Pox: An American History

Read Online and Download Ebook Pox: An American History

Download Pox: An American History

After getting this publication somehow, you will see just how this book is really vital for you. It is not only for getting the urged publications to write however likewise the incredible lessons as well as perceptions of guide. When you really love to check out, try Pox: An American History currently and read it. You will certainly never be regret after getting this book. It will certainly show you and also lead you to obtain better lesson.

Pox: An American History

Pox: An American History


Pox: An American History


Download Pox: An American History

Do you do any of these points that will assist you to be an outstanding character? Do you do some parts of those? Lots of people have determination to be an excellent person in all problem. Restricted condition and situation does not imply that it's limited to do something much better. When you wish to determine to do something much better, it is required for you to take Pox: An American History for your assistance.

Nonetheless, this period also enable you to get guide from lots of resources. The off line publication store might be an usual location to see to obtain guide. But now, you can also find it in the on-line library. This website is among the internet library where you can locate your picked one to check out. Currently, the presented Pox: An American History is a book that you can find here. This publication tends to be guide that will certainly provide you brand-new motivations.

The reason of lots of people selects this Pox: An American History as the recommendation reveals as a result of the needs in this day. We have some specific ways just how the books exist. Beginning with words choices, attached topic, as well as easy-carried language style, how the author makes this Pox: An American History is really straightforward. However, it showcases the professional that could influence you much easier.

When his is the time for you to constantly make deal with the feature of guide, you could make bargain that the book is actually suggested for you to obtain the best idea. This is not just best concepts to get the life however also to undergo the life. The way of living is often conformed to the case of perfections, but it will be such thing to do. As well as now, the book is once again suggested here to check out.

Pox: An American History

The untold story of how America's Progressive-era war on smallpox sparked one of the great civil liberties battles of the 20th century.

At the turn of the last century, a powerful smallpox epidemic swept the United States from coast to coast. The age-old disease spread swiftly through an increasingly interconnected American landscape: from southern tobacco plantations to the dense immigrant neighborhoods of northern cities to far-flung villages on the edges of the nascent American empire.

In Pox, award-winning historian Michael Willrich offers a gripping chronicle of how the nation's continent-wide fight against smallpox launched one of the most important civil liberties struggles of the 20th century.

At the dawn of the activist Progressive era and during a moment of great optimism about modern medicine, the government responded to the deadly epidemic by calling for universal compulsory vaccination. To enforce the law, public health authorities relied on quarantines, pesthouses, and "virus squads": corps of doctors and club-wielding police. Though these measures eventually contained the disease, they also sparked a wave of popular resistance among Americans who perceived them as a threat to their health and to their rights.

At the time, anti-vaccinationists were often dismissed as misguided cranks, but Willrich argues that they belonged to a wider legacy of American dissent that attended the rise of an increasingly powerful government. While a well-organized anti-vaccination movement sprang up during these years, many Americans resisted in subtler ways - by concealing sick family members or forging immunization certificates. Pox introduces us to memorable characters on both sides of the debate, from Henning Jacobson, a Swedish Lutheran minister whose battle against vaccination went all the way to the Supreme Court, to C. P. Wertenbaker, a federal surgeon who saw himself as a medical missionary combating a deadly - and preventable - disease. As Willrich suggests, many of the questions first raised by the Progressive-era antivaccination movement are still with us: How far should the government go to protect us from peril? What happens when the interests of public health collide with religious beliefs and personal conscience? In Pox, Willrich delivers a riveting tale about the clash of modern medicine, civil liberties, and government power at the turn of the last century that resonates powerfully today.

Your recently viewed items and featured recommendations

View or edit your browsing history

After viewing product detail pages, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in.

Product details

#detail-bullets .content {

margin: 0.5em 0px 0em 25px !important;

}

Audible Audiobook

Listening Length: 14 hours and 8 minutes

Program Type: Audiobook

Version: Unabridged

Publisher: Penguin Audio

Audible.com Release Date: April 1, 2011

Whispersync for Voice: Ready

Language: English, English

ASIN: B004USSGCW

Amazon Best Sellers Rank:

This is a story of medical science and public health officials both battling fear, ignorance, stubbornness to new scientific advances and yet political and social engineering correctness of its day, all in the name of finding a way to treat and/or prevent smallpox more technically called variola. The expression MAY THE POX BE UPON YOU was considered one of the worse curses of earlier days and a play upon the title of this review.This is a 422 page book with 73 pages of cites, notes, and index, so is well researched and not casually written, yet it reads like a wonderful medical and social novel. The book opens with trying to pin down the beginning of the NYC smallpox outbreak at the turn of the 20th Century. It ascribes one of the early documented cases to Madeline Lyon a 12yo girl diagnosed on 11/27/1900 the Tuesday before Thanksgiving of that year.Over the centuries, smallpox was considered to be the deadliest contagious disease in the world with some 300 million deaths through the 20th century and an average mortality rate of 25-30%, but which could vary from a mere 10% to a staggering 60% depending on the strain involved. This struggle for a prevention or cure also turned out to be one of the first and one of the most important struggles for civil liberties regarding the fight against mandatory vaccination for the good of the populace as a whole, similar to the feelings some have about childhood vaccines today. Around the turn of the 20th Century and even somewhat later the disease was thought to be brought on by outsiders and predominantly male Negroes. And it is true that Blacks and males suffered in disproportionate degrees, but it was due primarily to their proximate living conditions in labor camps of the day and not due to race or gender. Yet, as it typical, society always needs someone to blame.Even though Edward Jenner discovered a vaccine to prevent smallpox by using the cowpox virus [the word vaccine comes from the Latin word vaccina referring to bovines] it wasn't officially eradicated until 1980, with the last documented case of young Somali girl on 10/31/1977.Smallpox was the disease upon which the field of immunology was founded, and helped spur the discovery of two important medical developments; the first being freeze dried vaccines which allowed their potency to last much longer and the second being the bi-bifurcated needle which allowed 4X as many people to be vaccinated with the same amount of innoculant.The novel aspect of the story is well told in the discussion of various epidemic outbreaks and how the medical and political teams worked together and against each other with each trying to maintain their respective fiefdoms. It is a great read for any person interested in medical history and scientific sleuthing.

C'mon Penguin, spring for an editor! The book covers important material but is so repetitive and disorganized it's practically unreadable. Too bad.

I had to read this book for a class and it was surprisingly interesting. Definitely puts the smallpox epidemic into the context of it's time.

This is about the conflicts in the history of immunization and it still goes on. The author did a great job with the research and writing.

This book was recommended to me by a niece. It is an interesting read. Never realized that smallpox was so rampant in the United States. Recommend to anyone interested in this type of history.

Boring, very boring.

I recommend this book to everyone.

I really felt like this was more of a history of the vaccination movement rather than a history of small pox. It was interesting to read about how many people were more afraid of the vaccination than small pox. I also had no idea the amount of force that was used to vaccinate people at that time. It was rather shocking, and yet it really was necessary to protect people from themselves.I only gave the book three stars, because I really felt like the author kept repeating himself, especially in the first half of the book. It was a real slog to get through, but it was well worth it. I learned a lot.(

Pox: An American History PDF
Pox: An American History EPub
Pox: An American History Doc
Pox: An American History iBooks
Pox: An American History rtf
Pox: An American History Mobipocket
Pox: An American History Kindle

Pox: An American History PDF

Pox: An American History PDF

Pox: An American History PDF
Pox: An American History PDF

Pox: An American History


Home