Deadly Outbreaks: How Medical Detectives Save Lives Threatened by Killer Pandemics, Exotic Viruses, and Drug-Resistant Parasites
Always be ready for the unexpected could be a motto for epidemiologists. And the unexpected might be a link between lots of dead birds and a cluster of patients with encephalitis, or a connection between the brains of slaughtered hogs and multiple ­employees experiencing muscle weakness. Levitt reviews seven medical mysteries that appeared between 1976 and 2007 and reports on the lessons learned. Some of these outbreaks are familiar: Legionnaires’ disease in Philadelphia in 1976, hantavirus in the Four Corners region in 1993, and West Nile virus in New York City in 1999. Other difficult-to-solve cases described in the book include a salmonella scare due to contaminated ice cream in Minnesota, drug-resistant malaria in a Cambodian refugee camp, suspicious deaths in a Toronto children’s hospital, and progressive inflammatory neuropathy (nerve damage) afflicting workers in a Minnesota meatpacking plant. Levitt, a scientist with the Centers for Disease Control, portrays epidemiologists as disease detectives who tirelessly hunt for clues and excel at deductive reasoning. Even Sherlock Holmes would be proud of this astute group of professionals. --Tony Miksanek