Stay Informed: Books on Pandemics

Are you looking for more information on the spread of disease throughout history and today? Check out Macmillan’s offerings on pandemics and more to stay informed.

THE END OF EPIDEMICS: The Looming Threat to Humanity and How to Stop It by Jonathan D. Quick, MD, with Bronwyn Fryer

Duke Global Health Institute faculty member and past Chair of the Global Health Council Dr. Jonathan D. Quick examines the eradication of smallpox and devastating effects of influenza, AIDS, SARS, Ebola, and other viral diseases. Analyzing local and global efforts to contain these diseases and citing firsthand accounts of failure and success, Dr. Quick proposes a new set of actions which he has coined “The Power of Seven,” to end epidemics before they can begin.

PANDEMIC: Tracking Contagions, from Cholera to Ebola and Beyond by Sonia Shah

Prizewinning science journalist Sonia Shah presents a startling examination of the history of viral infections that have ravaged humanity—and how that knowledge prepares us to stop the next worldwide outbreak.

THE FEVER: How Malaria Has Ruled Humankind for 500,000 Years by Sonia Shah

How does malaria, a parasitic disease that we’ve known how to prevent for more than a century, still infect three hundred million people every year, killing nearly one million of them? In THE FEVER, the journalist Sonia Shah sets out to answer this question, delivering a timely, inquisitive chronicle of the illness and its influence on human lives.

FLU: The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus That Caused It by Gina Kolata

Gina Kolata, an acclaimed reporter for The New York Times, unravels the mystery of this lethal virus with the high drama of a great adventure story. Delving into the history of the flu and previous epidemics, detailing the science and the latest understanding of this mortal disease, Kolata addresses the prospects for a great epidemic recurring, and, most important, what can be done to prevent it.

PANDEMIC 1918: Eyewitness Accounts from the Greatest Medical Holocaust in Modern History by Catharine Arnold

Before AIDS or coronavirus, there was the Spanish Flu — Catharine Arnold’s gripping narrative, marks the 100th anniversary of an epidemic that altered world history.

THE VIRAL STORM: The Dawn of a New Pandemic Age by Nathan Wolfe

Stanford University biologist Nathan Wolfe reveals the origins of the world’s most deadly diseases and how we can combat and stop contagions.

and in fiction…

SEVERANCE by Ling Ma

Maybe it’s the end of the world, but not for Candace Chen, a millennial, first-generation American and office drone meandering her way into adulthood in Ling Ma’s offbeat, wryly funny, apocalyptic satire.

THE END OF EPIDEMICS: The Looming Threat to Humanity and How to Stop It by Jonathan D. Quick, MD, with Bronwyn Fryer, ISBN 9781250117779, available now
PANDEMIC: Tracking Contagions, from Cholera to Ebola and Beyond by Sonia Shah, ISBN 9781250118004, available now
THE FEVER: How Malaria Has Ruled Humankind for 500,000 Years by Sonia Shah, ISBN 9780312573010, available now
FLU: The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus That Caused It by Gina Kolata, ISBN 9781429979351, available now
PANDEMIC 1918: Eyewitness Accounts from the Greatest Medical Holocaust in Modern History by Catharine Arnold, ISBN 9781250139436, available now
THE VIRAL STORM: The Dawn of a New Pandemic Age by Nathan Wolfe, ISBN 9781250012210, available now
SEVERANCE by Ling Ma, ISBN 9781250214997, available now