Tidy bedrooms, how to deal with future pandemics, the human side to Stephen Hawking and pictures in the sand
In one of many unexpected outcomes of 2020, “the science” has become big news. Politicians are claiming it, protesters are disputing it, and all of a sudden everyone is an expert on superspreader events, RNA vaccines and what happens at the bottom of an Excel spreadsheet. It’s hard to know who to trust, and it’s more important than ever that the public has a basic understanding of what “science” says, so we are less likely to be deceived. Fortunately, a number of excellent writers are here to make it accessible, absorbing and staggeringly informative.
The topical Outbreaks and Epidemicsby Meera Senthilingam (Icon), for example, is crammed with information on the history and context of diseases we think we know about. It explains how effective track and trace, combined with a thorough vaccination programme, was crucial in the eradication of smallpox, and why climate crisis and drug resistance make future pandemics more likely. It further shows how politics affects the way we treat disease: the chapter on tuberculosis is titled “What happens when nobody cares”. It even manages a last-minute update about Covid-19. (We could have been a lot more ready if we’d really wanted to be.)
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