A lesson learned from PATHOGENESIS: A HISTORY OF THE WORLD IN EIGHT PLAGUES, by Jonathan Kennedy
We ignore the power of viruses and bacteria at our own peril. In our modern world, we have largely been shielded from the effects of deadly plagues, especially if you live in a relatively modern and developed nation. Of course, we all just lived through the trauma of COVID, a disease that killed less than 1% of the American population yet still caused years worth of massive disruption to people's lives, not to mention the overall global economy. Nonetheless, the western world today is a much more healthy and calm place than it was even a century ago, and that has caused modern generations to assume that vanquishing plagues is as simple of a process as following certain social media trends and advice without having to go through the discomfort and annoyance of modern vaccinations. As Jonathan Kennedy subtly notes in his study Pathogenesis: A History of the World in Eight Plagues , we take that laissez faire stance at our own great peril. As his book makes clear, the ...