"At the height of WWI, history's most lethal influenza virus erupted in an army camp in Kansas, moved east with American troops, then exploded, killing as many as 100 million people worldwide. It killed more people in twenty-four months than AIDS killed in twenty-four years, more in a year than the Black Death killed in a century. But this was not the Middle Ages, and 1918 marked the first collision of science and epidemic disease. Revised to reflect...

"Growing up in a New Jersey factory town in the 1980s, Daisy Hernández believed that her aunt had become deathly ill from eating an apple. No one in her family, in either the United States or Colombia, spoke of infectious diseases, and even into her thirties, she only knew that her aunt had died of a rare illness called Chagas. But as Hernández dug deeper, she discovered that Chagas--or the kissing bug disease--is more prevalent in the United States...

Vaccines have saved more lives than any other single medical advance. Yet today only four companies make vaccines, and there is a growing crisis in vaccine availability. Why has this happened? This remarkable book recounts for the first time a devastating episode in 1955 at Cutter Laboratories in Berkeley, California, that has led many pharmaceutical companies to abandon vaccine manufacture. Drawing on interviews with public health officials, pharmaceutical...

In San Diego in 1918, as deadly influenza and World War I take their toll, sixteen-year-old Mary Shelley Black watches desperate mourners flock to séances and spirit photographers for comfort and, despite her scientific leanings, must consider if ghosts are real when her first love, killed in battle, returns.

"Between August 1918 and March 1919 the Spanish influenza spread worldwide, claiming at least 30 million lives, more people than perished in the fighting of the First World War. It proved fatal to at least a half-million Americans. Yet, the Spanish flu pandemic is largely forgotten today. In this vivid narrative, Alfred W. Crosby recounts the course of the pandemic during the panic-stricken months of 1918 and 1919, measures its impact on American...

"The year is 1918. World War I is nearing its end. But the world is just beginning to suffer from a deadly pandemic. Within months, the deadly flu virus has spread around the world, infecting and killing tens of millions of people. As you return from the war, will you go to see your family and friends or quarantine to keep your loved ones safe? Will you shut down your small store to avoid spreading the virus? Will you quit your job as a teacher in...

The 1964 murder of a nationally known cancer researcher sets the stage for this gripping exposé of medical professionals enmeshed in covert government operations over the course of three decades. Following a trail of police records, FBI files, cancer statistics, and medical journals, this revealing book presents evidence of a web of medical secret-keeping that began with the handling of evidence in the JFK assassination and continued apace, sweeping...

Crosby, acclaimed author of "The American Plague," explores the frightening history of a long forgotten disease--sleeping sickness--and details the frantic effort to conquer it before it strikes again.

During the 1918 influenza outbreak, nine-year-old Rettie seeks ways to make Thanksgiving special for her siblings and ailing mother.