The Great Influenza: A Comprehensive Look at the Most Devastating Pandemic in History

Abhi: Must read to understand how the world witnessed and coped and fought the pandemic and how certain mavericks in US health sector helped find an end to the pandemic and what parallels are we seeing in Covid. However the author could have been more precise. The books has too much details, some not required and hence makes the reading uninteresting in the second half

India on Feb 20, 2022

K. Johnson: If you want to know how research and medicine evolved in the world, and what enticed great minds to drive to understand the how and why diseases/nature can lead to pandemics and just about every malady related, this is the book to read.
The men and women talked about in this book saved your life while risking their own, over 100 years ago.
The people and their discoveries explained in this book are amazing, without any one of them, the human race would not be, as we know it today.
This not a bedtime story, just the facts, just the way it happened and just in time.

Canada on Jul 20, 2021

Amazon Customer: I bought this one based on Gates Notes recommendations. The book is a great, very detailed and a truly historic account of the medical profession and scientific community in the US. It also provides an accurate account of the 1918-20 Influenza Pandemic and its intertwining with the relevant historic events of those years. It is a bit too detailed and repetitive throughout and somewhat lacks sistematization which would make it easier to follow at times. Nonetheless it is a good book but it is worth to consider if your interest in the subject truly justifies such a detailed, long book.

Spain on Mar 11, 2021

Woots: I bought this book for my husband's birthday. It seemed relevant at this time of covid-19 being around. He is finding it absorbing and keeps quoting from some of the pages, comparing what went on in the early 20th century to what's happening right now. The writing is detailed and interesting; I have a feeling the book will be shared around many friends due to its topicality. A highly recommended read.

United Kingdom on Sep 30, 2020

kate bridges: 30% would have been an interesting read. There are too many biographical details about the scientists that are not of interest. It seems that every journal or record was included just because it was available. It watered down the gripping factual information about the work that was done to stop the virus. The explanation of the biological facts of how viruses invade the body was really interesting. In summary, I would say less is more. But don't let that put you off. You can sift through and have a great read.

United Kingdom on Jun 17, 2020

John Walker: In the year 1800, the practice of medicine had changed little from that in antiquity. The rapid progress in other sciences in the 18th century had had little impact on medicine, which one historian called “the withered arm of science”. This began to change as the 19th century progressed. Researchers, mostly in Europe and especially in Germany, began to lay the foundations for a scientific approach to medicine and public health, understanding the causes of disease and searching for means of prevention and cure. The invention of new instruments for medical examination, anesthesia, and antiseptic procedures began to transform the practice of medicine and surgery.

All of these advances were slow to arrive in the United States. As late as 1900 only one medical school in the U.S. required applicants to have a college degree, and only 20% of schools required a high school diploma. More than a hundred U.S. medical schools accepted any applicant who could pay, and many graduated doctors who had never seen a patient or done any laboratory work in science. In the 1870s, only 10% of the professors at Harvard's medical school had a Ph.D.

In 1873, Johns Hopkins died, leaving...

United States on Jan 11, 2020

T. Graczewski: “Influenza killed more people in [1918] than the Black Death of the Middle Ages killed in a century; it killed more people in 24-weeks than AIDS has killed in 24-years.” Those are some pretty sobering statistics. John Barry takes an oddly forgotten moment in world history and makes it comes to life in this thorough, fast-paced and sharply written history of the great Spanish Influenza pandemic that struck the globe at the end of the First World War.

Barry begins his narrative with a terrific overview of the history of medical science. The Warriors highlights the critical role played by Johns Hopkins University and Hospital in reforming and advancing the cause. The amazing thing is how stunted medical science remained for so long, essentially unaltered from the time of Hippocrates and Galens to the mid-nineteenth century. Indeed, medicine was “the withered arm of science.” This backwardness can be attributed to the failure to ask two basic questions: “What can I know? How can I know it?” For centuries – actually millennia – medicine was a basic exercise in observation, not probing experimentation. It was treated like Newton under the apple tree, unlocking the...

United States on Mar 15, 2016