A Journal of the Plague Year

A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe

The Librivox narration of this book was very well done. It was easy to understand, even at 4x speed. In the book, Defoe details the experience in England during a year of the bubonic plague. There is debate as to whether this should be considered "history" or "historical fiction". Regardless of what it is, the author excellently portrays the experiences living through the era. Many of the same concerns that we have had during the Covid-19 pandemic are represented in this period. Some people think they are above it and then find themselves suffering. The society is turned inside out as they are trying to manage the plague. The basic economy has trouble functioning since there is no telling what the future will entail.

Pox Romana: The Plague That Shook the Roman World

Pox Romana: The Plague That Shook the Roman World by Colin Elliott

A plague broke through the Roman world and killed a large portion of the population. It helped amplify some of the problems that were occuring in the empire. In some cases, the responses were worse than the problems. Price controls seem like a good solution until they cause a shortage. A form of religious piety also arose as an attempt to appease the gods. Alas, this also involved attacks on those that were "different" (like Christians). The Christian ended up doing better despite the persecution. They cared for the sick. This helped them gain immunity and thus greater numbers survived.

We are unsure what the plague was that hit Rome. Perhaps it was small pox, or perhaps it was something else. There seemed to also be a plague in China around the same time, so it could have been global. There seemed to be a significant reduction in human activity during this time. Records in the Greenland ice confirm some of this changes. The epidemic was likely spread via soldiers and trade. The city got hit harder, likely due to people living in close quarters without immunity. Modern medicine can also trace some of its roots to the Roman plague.

The book is very cautious in the analysis. There are many possibilities. We are not sure what happened, but it can be fun to analyze.

The Hot Zone: A Terrifying True Story

A resident in Africa visited a cave. A week later he started to get sick. By the time he got to the hospital his internal organs were falling apart in his body. He did not live long. The doctor that attempted to help him also go sick, but managed to survive.

Marburg and Ebola are related diseases that have extreme mortality in humans and other primates. This book focuses on the Ebola outbreak that started in a monkey facility in Northern Virginia. It was a while before they realized that they were dying of Ebola, but by then some people were infected. Luckily this variant was not fatal in humans and was able to be controlled. The story is a well written thriller that provides scientific detail that flows well with the story.

The Viral Underclass: The Human Toll When Inequality and Disease Collide

The Viral Underclass purports to explore how inequality leads to negative societal outcomes when diseases hit. In actuality, it takes advantage of interest in racism and COVID-19 to talk about AIDS. The arguments both overreach and contradict themselves. On one side, there is sympathy for essential workers, sex workers, trans and people of color because they cannot work from home during an epidemic. On the other hand, anti-maskers that cannot work from home are criticized. They are lumped together with wealthy white anti-vaxers. He bemoans poor states for the high rate of COVID deaths. Is because the poor don't have access to prophylactics? Or is it that they don't want to?

The bulk of the book discusses gay culture and AIDS. The author covered a case where a gay black man was convicted for spreading AIDS to others. He legitimately criticizes the stigma and approach to testing. If somebody never tests, then they cannot be convicted. Testing is beneficial to society, yet a positive test can lead to somebody being subjected to penalties.

Beyond AIDS, the author reaches for strings for just about anything to make his argument. Racism, Speciesism, Ableism. Any group that "others" discriminate against is part of the viral underclass. It is not their fault they get sick, they are just victims of society. The argument is weakened by cherry-picking facts based on a certain worldview.

Capitalism is attacked for producing this underclass. It is also criticized for charging money for vaccines and other prophylactics. (Missed is the fact that capitalism was able to quickly produce COVID-19 vaccines. A few companies succeeded and made a lot of money. Many other companies tried, yet failed to produce working vaccines.)  Anarchy is viewed as the solution that would resolve this. Everybody would just work together nicely without big government and business in the way. In the ideal world, maybe. But with billions of people? Small scale communes have broken down. Could earth survive? 

This could have been a good book about the stigma of AIDS and the need to balance punishment of bad behavior with public health. Instead it tried to cast a wider net and failed miserably.

Illustrious Dead

Illustrious dead is a nice history of the Napoleanic Invasion of Russia with an emphasis on the role that disease (especially typhus) played. It also has plenty of background on how typhus works and is caught.

From the intro, I thought it would focus on the disease. Instead, it presents a chronology of Napolean's Russian campaign, spending time to emphasize how typhus was a prime factor in Napolean's defeat. The Russian leaders were portrayed as largely incompetent generals who mostly got lucky. Napolean's army was one of largest assembled. This lead to some logistical problems. However, more critical was the dying off that occurred, mostly due to typhus. Typhus spreads via lice. War provides the ideal situation for them to spread, as it keeps people in close quarters under harsh conditions. Typhus and cellular mitochondria arose from a common ancestor, and have both been around for millions of years. Typhus has been very resilient through years adapting just enough to survive without causing too much damage. Today, it can be treateted with antibiotics or a vaccine. However, it still is prone to third world epidemics.

The book strikes a nice balance between war and medical history. Without the disease Napolean may have taken over all of Europe. Without Malaria, he may have taken over all of America. How would the world be different today if it were not for the diseases?