Shah, Sonia

"[Shah] . . . upends our centuries-long assumptions about migration through science, history, and reporting--predicting its lifesaving power in the face of climate change [and argues that] . . . far from being a disruptive behavior to be quelled at any cost, migration is an ancient and lifesaving response to environmental change, a biological imperative as necessary as breathing. . . Migration is not the crisis--it is the solution. Conclusively tracking the history of misinformation from the 18th century through today's anti-immigration policies, [Shah] . . . makes the case for a future in which migration is not a source of fear, but of hope"--Provided by publisher.

"From the author of The Fever, a wide-ranging inquiry into the origins of pandemics Interweaving history, original reportage, and personal narrative, Pandemic explores the origins of epidemics, drawing parallels between the story of cholera-one of history's most disruptive and deadly pathogens-and the new pathogens that stalk humankind today, from Ebola and avian influenza to drug-resistant superbugs. More than three hundred infectious diseases have emerged or reemerged in new territory during the past fifty years, and 90 percent of epidemiologists expect that one of them will cause a disruptive, deadly pandemic sometime in the next two generations. To reveal how that might happen, Sonia Shah tracks each stage of cholera's dramatic journey from harmless microbe to world-changing pandemic, from its 1817 emergence in the South Asian hinterlands to its rapid dispersal across the nineteenth-century world and its latest beachhead in Haiti. She reports on the pathogens following in cholera's footsteps, from the MRSA bacterium that besieges her own family to the never-before-seen killers emerging from China's wet markets, the surgical wards of New Delhi, the slums of Port-au-Prince, and the suburban backyards of the East Coast. By delving into the convoluted science, strange politics, and checkered history of one of the world's deadliest diseases, Pandemic reveals what the next epidemic might look like-and what we can do to prevent it"--.

The author chronicles the history of malaria and it's effect on humankind for thousands of years, describing why science has not been able to eradicate the disease.

Examines clinical drug trials in developing countries of Africa and Asia, discussing the pharmaceutical industry's motivation to test on poor people, the treatment of patients, and ethical issues involved; and providing what the author believes to be solutions to the problem.