The Viral Storm: The Dawn of a New Pandemic Age by Nathan Wolfe | Goodreads
The Viral Storm: The Dawn of a New Pandemic Age
by
Nathan Wolfe
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In The Viral Storm award-winning biologist Nathan Wolfe - known as 'the Indiana Jones of virus hunters' for his work in jungles and rain forests across the world - shows the threat of a global pandemic is greater than we have ever imagined.
The Viral Storm examines how viruses like HIV, swine flu, and bird flu have almost wiped us out in the past - and may do so in the future. It explores why modern life makes us so vulnerable to global pandemics, and what new technologies can do to prevent them. Wolfe's provocative vision may leave you feeling distinctly uncomfortable - but it will reveal exactly what it is we are up against.
Nathan Wolfe is the Lorry I. Lokey Visiting Professor in Human Biology at Stanford University and Director of Global Viral Forecasting, a pandemic early warning system which monitors the spillover of novel infectious agents from animals into humans. Wolfe has been published in or profiled by Nature, Science, The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Economist, Forbes and many others. Wolfe was the recipient of a Fulbright fellowship in 1997 and was awarded the National Institutes of Health (NIH) International Research Scientist Development Award in 1999 and the prestigious NIH Director's Pioneer Award in 2005.
Reviews:
'An excellent piece of scientific gothic, rich in descriptions of the threat we face from emerging viruses' Nature
'Part autobiography, part warning ... enthralling' BBC Focus
'Quietly terrifying ... It's hard not to feel a bit feverish at times while reading' Boston Globe
'Wolfe has an important story to tell and as a virologist at the forefront of pandemic forecasting, he is the perfect person to tell it. He explains the science clearly and never stoops to sensationalism - the evidence of our increasing vulnerability to pandemics speaks for itself' Guardian
'The plague-ridden future imagined by this authoritative, measured, yet gripping book is extremely alarming' Sunday Times
'Nathan Wolfe is saving the world from near-inevitable pandemic ... a kick-ass book' Mary Roach, author of Stiff
'The world's most prominent virus hunter' New Yorker
'A good place to start preparing for what might come' New Humanist
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3.77 · Rating details · 1,846 ratings · 200 reviews
Dynamic young Stanford biologist Nathan Wolfe reveals the surprising origins of the world's most deadly viruses, and how we can overcome catastrophic pandemics.
In The Viral Storm, award-winning biologist Nathan Wolfe tells the story of how viruses and human beings have evolved side by side through history; how deadly viruses like HIV, swine flu, and bird flu almost wiped ...more
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Hardcover, 320 pages
Published October 11th 2011 by Times Books (first published October 1st 2011)
ISBN
0805091947 (ISBN13: 9780805091946)
Edition Language
English
Literary Awards
Royal Society Science Book Prize Nominee for Science Books (2012)
Other Editions (13)
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Mar 24, 2013Kate rated it did not like it
An oversimplified view of infectious disease that lacked new information for anyone even moderately well-read in the field, I was disappointed by Nathan Wolfe's book. Wolfe attempted to follow the pattern so often used by infectious disease literature - open with a case study of a real person infected by the disease before transitioning into more depth information on the microbe. However, the opening anecdotes frequently ended up being unconnected to the rest of the chapter. Wolfe then failed to offer any in-depth information on whatever subject he was attempting to cover, relying instead on sweeping generalizations that failed to demonstrate any real understanding of infectious disease. I am not an expert in epidemiology; however, by merely being interested in the topic and having read other books in the field, Wolfe managed to provide me with absolutely no unique information.
Also detracting from this book was the frequent name-dropping of scientists that Wolfe has worked with. At time, the book read more like an autobiography/CV than an actual non-fiction work. I, as the reader, never learned about the research these people were doing, nor how it impacted the field (although I did learn things such as the name of their pets and how Wolfe met them).
If you're looking for a good book about disease, this isn't it. Try someone like Laurie Garret, who demonstrates a thorough understanding of the field of infectious disease AND has strong writing ability. Wolfe apparently lacks both.
Not worth the money or the time. (less)
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Feb 23, 2012Jenny Brown rated it did not like it
It sounds like Wolfe has done some interesting research and is working hard to prevent a new viral pandemic, but if you want the details you'll have to look elsewhere, because this poorly edited, badly written book won't give them to you.
Most chapters start with a punchy description of some poor schnook dying of a viral disease, but we learn almost nothing else about that disease and the rest of the chapter gives us only vague dumbed down overview of some topic that, if you have read anything published in the popular science press about infection over the past five years you've already read about in far more detail elsewhere.
The author drops the names of supposedly important researchers he's worked with around the world, without giving us any substantive description of those researchers or their research. Many are described as "incredibly" this or that. The flatness of the prose kept reminding me of freshman college papers I'd graded years ago.
But this wasn't a paper by an inarticulate college freshman. It was an expensive book by someone who is hyped to the skies on the cover flap so I expected to learn something. Alas, with each chapter I read my frustration grew, as Wolfe introduced topic after topic that I would have liked to learn something about, only to drop it after a few paragraphs so he could introduce some other topic he'd drop latter.
The only positive thing I can say about this book is that it is really clear that, unlike many books by science notables, it clearly wasn't ghosted. There is no trace that a professional writer had any hand in writing this dull, repetitive, uninformative book.
(less)
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Feb 14, 2020Ericka Clouther rated it really liked it
Shelves: nonfiction, science, history, health, medicine, biology, 2010s, author-male, pandemic, 0-borrowed
It's a bit disorganized for me, and considering how interested (read: worried) I am in this topic, I found it a bit dull. However, the tidbits I learned here and there about pandemic viruses in general and specific viruses in particular, I think it was well worth my time to read. The book had some particularly interesting facts regarding the AIDS virus and the Nipah virus (from bats to pigs to people). The connection between pandemics and eating meat, in general, is interesting. I've read before about Toxoplasma Gondii, but it's so crazy, it never disappoints, and I was interested in the new hypothesis about cat hoarders potentially being infected- why is that so hard to find out for sure though? I've read before about helpful bacteria, particularly gut bacteria, but this is the first I've heard of potentially helpful viruses. Finally, I thought it was interesting that Nathan Wolfe's data collection dreams (for preventing pandemics) are precisely Edward Snowden's nightmares. There seem to be many sides to the data debate, not just two. (less)
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Sep 19, 2016Donna rated it liked it
Shelves: non-fiction
I wanted to read this because it seemed relevant considering recent headlines. When I started this book, I thought this was not for me.....it was way too scientific and even though I like research, it just wasn't meaning anything to me. It reminded me of a bad college lecture. But once I settled into the rigor of this book, I actually started thinking that it was interesting. I enjoyed the connections the author was making as he linked so many things to viruses, their development and the spreading of them .... urbanization being the fastest way of sharing illness. I may be a book geek, but I am by no means a science geek, so overall, I liked this. 3 stars. (less)
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Jan 19, 2012Andy rated it did not like it
This is alarmist baloney. The author either doesn't know what he's talking about or else is deliberately misleading the reader.
Right from the start, for example, on page 9, he writes "H5N1 is important because it kills remarkably effectively. The virus's case fatality rate, or the percentage of infected individuals that die, is around 60 percent. For a microbe, that's incredibly deadly."
The reason this statement is so incredible is because it's not true.
First of all, he has the wrong definition of "case fatality rate." Case fatality generally refers to how many people die among those who are sick in the hospital. It is not the same thing as the "percentage of infected individuals that die" because not everyone infected gets sick, let alone sick enough to be in the hospital. The first number is like looking at how many deaths there are on a cruise ship that has crashed and sunk. The second is like looking at how likely you are to die if you ever go on a cruise.
The percentage of infected individuals that die from H5N1 is nowhere near 60%. In fact, it is not known because no one has ever published the necessary studies, but based on the best available data from the CDC it is closer to 0% than to 60%. If you look up the most cited paper on the topic (available free at http://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/N...) you can see that it says "The frequencies of human infection have not been determined, and seroprevalence studies are urgently needed." The international experts writing the paper make a clear distinction between case fatality and death-to-infection-ratio.
If this guy messes up the most basic concepts and facts about infectious diseases, I don't think he should be considered an expert on the topic of pandemics. (less)
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Oct 02, 2014Betsy Ashton rated it really liked it
Nathan Wolfe's The Viral Storm should be required reading for everyone talking or worrying hysterically about the current Ebola outbreak. An internationally recognized expert in the fields of viral forecasting, immunology, infectious diseases and human biology, Dr. Wolfe's book reads like a primer rather than a text book. His language is approachable for all readers.
He breaks down how viruses, both good and evil, developed alongside humans. He tracks the history of viruses that are benign. We need them in our bodies to process food and protect us from the evil viruses.
His discussions on how deadly viruses move from animal hosts to human hosts are the stuff of thrillers. Some, he points out, infect an individual and kill it, thereby stopping the transmission. Others, like HIV, swine flu and bird flu, are transmitted from human to human. Some,like Ebola and HIV, can only be transmitted through contact with bodily fluids. Others, swine and bird flu, are actually more dangerous because they easily pass through the human population by droplets in the air.
I bought this book for research for a mystery I'm writing. The book works on that dimension. More importantly, it works as an educational work that takes the hysteria out of pandemics by talking calmly about what these viruses are, how they are transmitted and how they can be forecast at the beginning of an outbreak before it becomes an epidemic or, worse, a pandemic.
I urge anyone interested in learning about illnesses to read this book. You will be better informed. Dr. Wolfe's journey is mankind's. (less)
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Nov 14, 2011Molly rated it really liked it
This is a good, easy to read overview of the science of viruses - it doesn't match the page-turning quality of Richard Preston's the Hot Zone, but what does? Nathan Wolf focuses on the science, rather than the stories, of tracking viruses and viral diseases and gives you the basics: what viruses are, how they infect humans (by way of birds and mammals), how viruses extend their range and how he and other scientists are working to catch the next viral epidemic before it wreaks havoc. That section was particularly interesting - the use of cell phones, twitter, and our digital habits to pin point when illnesses break out. But it's all fascinating and the book is a page-turner in its own way. I was never bored. (less)
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Feb 01, 2012Meg rated it it was amazing
Shelves: adult
This is one of the best non-fiction science books I have read. Nathan Wolfe, a biologist, though I think virologist would be more accurate, takes us into the world of viruses and their implications for humanity. His steady pace and even-handed way of presenting the facts makes this a very readable book for a novice such as myself. His explanations of how viruses function, react to one another, mutate, and harness the will of their hosts are easily understandable without being overly simplistic. It was totally engrossing from start to finish. (less)
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Jan 09, 2012Betsy Curlin rated it it was ok
This book seemed more focused on singing the praises of the author and his organization than on actually discussing viruses and their potential consequences.
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Sep 30, 2014Gary Beauregard Bottomley rated it liked it · review of another edition
The author gives a fairly good look at how Virologist think and see the world. He'll explain in general terms how they see the world and what kind of work they do. I would strongly recommend this book for anyone who thinks they might want to enter the field or for those who have not read any other books on similar topics.
It's obvious to me that the author knows a whole lot more about the subject, but in order to keep the book interesting for the widest possible audience he usually only explains the field in the most general terms.
For me, I wish the author would have written a more detailed book and my expectations weren't met. (less)
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Jan 14, 2012Amy rated it it was ok
Shelves: non-fiction, health-and-wellness
Less provocative than the title would lead you to believe, this book basically is a primer for the microbial world and how viruses jump from one species to another and within species. Probably more fun than your microbiology textbook, laced with anecdotes about chimp research in Africa, etc., but not for those looking for an exciting read about why bird flu will kill us all.
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Aug 10, 2014Rossdavidh rated it liked it
Shelves: black
Subtitle: The Dawn of a New Pandemic Age.
So, sometimes I am a bit concerned about the fact that I've been reading a bunch of books about disease and plague lately. But, you know, they're good, and part of why is that the history of disease is a kind of shadow history of the humans who harbor them. Just as the Black Death couldn't have happened if there hadn't been links (economic, cultural, and military) between Asia and Europe, and the conquest of the New World by the Old couldn't have happened if the germ arsenals on either side had been more evenly matched, the study of the new pandemics that threaten us is a good way of viewing the modern world. The perspective it offers is the right balance of familiar and unfamiliar, to be both interesting and disturbing.
The author of this book, Nathan Wolfe, has a dream, and this book is essentially his attempt to transfer that vision to the reader. Oh, yes, there's lots of science and history thrown in there, but that's mostly just because he's stuffed his brain full of so much of it that he can hardly avoid talking about it. No, what really drove him to write this book, I think, is the desire to will into existence a sort of pandemic Distant Early Warning system. He cannot do this alone, knowledgeable as he is, so he must convince enough of the rest of the world to give him the resources to do it.
To explain what such as system would look like, and why it would look that way, he has to give us some background. What is a pandemic? Where do they come from? How do they get from there to here? How can they be detected? What good would having an early warning do? Each of these questions takes some background, and some exposition, and we are fortunate that Wolfe is a skilled enough writer and storyteller to give us all of this in the right size pieces, packaged the right way, so that the very real human toll of disease isn't lost in a mass of numbers and proclamations of impending doom.
So, for example, when he tells us about where H5N1 (aka "bird flu") was first detected, he tells us that the first victim was a six-year old boy in Thailand, but he also tells us that he "loved riding his bicycle, climbing trees, and playing with his plastic toy Dalmatian that pulled three puppies in tiny brown wagons as it barked mechanically." He tells us about the farm that the boy, Kaptan, lived on, his father's payment of $35 (a large sum for a rice farmer in Thailand) to get an ambulance to transfer him to Bangkok in the hope that he could get better care there, and includes a picture of Kaptan's older brother at the funeral, holding his picture. Wolfe puts details like this throughout the book, about not only the early victims, but also the researchers he works with who go into remote areas in Asia, Africa, and elsewhere to collect information on the movements of the enemy.
And that, in essence, is what modern pandemics have to teach us about the modern world. It is easy to get the impression that the world we live in is one in which the action is in North America, western Europe, and a few other relatively wealthy areas like Japan, plus a few hot spots like the Middle East with the right combination of political unrest and natural resources to get and keep our attention. This book reminds us that when the desparately poor of inland sub-saharan Africa use new logging roads (paid for in order to get lumber for the west, mostly), to find and butcher chimpanzees, we may not hear about it but that doesn't mean it won't affect us (see HIV, Ebola, etc.). If live animal markets in southeast Asia keep different species in close contact, one cage stacked atop another so that they pass microbes along with their feces from one layer down to the next, we may not like to hear about it but the influenza viruses that pass from chicken to pig to human will find us wherever on the globe we are.
Globalization isn't just a way to exchange western goods for lumber and rare earth metals; it's also a way to quickly and efficiently pass microbes of any sort that can live in humans, from that economic periphery back to New York, Tokyo, and London. We are, as a species, almost perfectly designed to suffer from pandemics, and Wolfe shows us many of the reasons why:
1) for reason or reasons still debated, our species experienced (tens of thousands of years ago) a "bottleneck", where our total population was as little as several thousand individuals. With it, we lost a great deal of the microbial diversity that lived inside us as a species. Like the Native Americans learned to their sorrow when the (more microbially diverse) Europeans showed up, if you live with fewer kinds of microbes, your immune system is relatively naive.
2) we, as a species, just love getting close to other animal species. Whether as pets, farm labor, or food sources, we put ourselves in a position to be exposed to the blood (and microbes) of a great variety of other species. Occasionally, those microbes will hit on a way of jumping the gap, and living in us as well.
3) the last few hundred years has seen an ever-accelerating expansion of humans into every corner of the globe, and every ecosystem, finding every possible source of alien (to our species) microbes we can. The people we send to do the dirty work are usually poor, without the money or time for modern hygiene or medical care, and this gives those microbes that jump the gap a relatively hospitable environment in which to acclimate to our species.
4) in the last fifty years, air travel has knit us together in one vast network. The bubonic plague reached Europe by boat, and took months to spread from country to country thereafter, but if such a plague came today, it would reach every continent on the planet within 72 hours or less.
Wolfe's idea, which he has begun to make into a reality, is to look for microbes where they come from, in the places where they are most likely to jump from the species we hunt, to the poorest Third World hunters and farmers who will catch them. Then, by identifying quickly which ones have the potential to wreak havoc worldwide, we could in theory send healthcare resources to the origin, helping the people there survive the incipient pandemic, so that it never evolves the ability to spread further.
I don't know if Wolfe's vision is one that can realistically be achieved. In many ways it sounds like climate change, terrorism, and other modern threats, caused by events in so many different parts of the world that we would need the ability to coordinate globally in order to deal with the problem. Our track record on that is not great, and I wonder if the problem is not so much in our inability to act with a united front, as in our inability to see that globalization is putting us at risk of dangers which we have no mechanisms for facing.
Wolfe, however, is nothing if not an optimist. He is a believer in the power of science, technology, and medicine to find a way. He writes with a clear sympathy for the many poor people who stand first in the path of the oncoming "viral storm", and has an obvious desire to be given the resources to help them (and thus help us). Whether you share his optimism or not, his analysis of the dangers we face is clearly written, informative, and carries enough personal passion to make the reader care. Wolfe is like the best teacher you had in high school, who taught his or her topic with such sincere enthusiasm for it that you loved the class whether you cared about that topic when you began it or not. Wolfe is a writer, thinker, and scientist to watch; we will hear from him again. Let's hope it's for his next book, instead of him testifying before Congress that if they would only fund science properly, maybe next time it could help protect us. (less)
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Dec 12, 2011Tessa in North Florida rated it it was amazing
Shelves: nonfiction, disease, nature-science
Not all scientists can write. Stanford visiting professor Nathan Wolfe can and does a superb job. Concepts which have been difficult for others to explain flow easily from Wolfe's pen. He brings us up-to-date and shares fascinating situations which show just how complex our world has become.
One of the most important concepts to take away from the book is that there is probably no single disease host or reservoir for any particular disease, as was previously thought. Rather, all species have a ...more
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Jun 14, 2017Jami rated it liked it
Shelves: audible-books, non-fiction
This book was easy to follow and understand, so it is good for its intended general audience. I do have to say it was dry in some spots, though. Many reviewers who already have knowledge in this field have panned the book for its simplicity and lack of new information, but that is not the target audience. There needs to be books at this level for people like me, who want a general understanding of the subject matter; the experts can get their information from peer reviewed articles in scientific journals.
As for the book itself, there were some interesting parts. I never thought much about viruses other than they are pesky things that make people sick. However, I was fascinated to learn that viruses actually time their release (hence the reason they lie dormant at times) and transmission passage to enhance their success at continuing its life cycle and ensure the success of their offspring. Its actually a bit chilling to think of them in that way, like little villains living in your body going "aha, the perfect time for spreading myself around is here!" The symptoms of some viruses, such as coughing, sneezing, etc., are designed to make sure that they are spread and continue to survive.
The most chilling part of this book for me was when the author talks about microbes that keep him awake at night. This is a case of knowing too much; ignorance can be bliss at times. He knows what potential there is for new viruses to emerge, as well as bio terror or bio error, and I imagine that knowledge can be pretty darn scary.
The last section was fascinating in terms of using cell phone data to pinpoint where natural disaster events are occurring as well as internet search terms to determine if pandemics are going to be occurring. The prospect of a pandemic of these new super bugs is scary, but maybe with the forecasting techniques the author describes, it can be controlled. (less)
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Oct 18, 2012Eric Jay Sonnenschein rated it really liked it
The Viral Storm is a fast, informative overview of the human interaction with microbes and infectious diseases. It is a good book to start with if you are interested in epidemiology and the scary possibility of pandemics. Anyone who has kept abreast of the various outbreaks in the past quarter-century will be familiar with much of this information, eg. HIV, Ebola, Avian flu, SARS, etc. but there is also much that is new and interesting, for instance, the appearance of Monkeypox in the remote forests of central Africa.
Nathan Wolfe is a biologist with extensive experience in virology. He is the medical counterpart of the tornado chasers. While he is not a physician, he has a passion for pandemics and has been in many "hot spots" tracking contagions we should be grateful to know little about. Wolfe writes in an anecdotal and personal style. His writing is not particularly "tight." It is full of obvious repetitions, and autobiographical asides, which can be annoying because the eager reader senses that the pages could be better filled with more detailed information about the subject.
Within the genre of non-fiction narrative about the pathogenesis and social impact of contagious diseases, Jared Diamond's book, Guns, Germs and Steel is much better written. However, Diamond is more interested in the historical impact of diseases and specifically to how they contributed to conquest than to how these microbes "jump" from one species to another and spread.
Because microbes and diseases still seem so alien to us, and are so potentially lethal, they hold the same power over our magination as monsters and dangerous animals. For this reason, medical narratives (but not clinical journal articles on which they are based, which are too technical to be accessible to most readers), will continue to entertain readers.
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Feb 04, 2018Nikki rated it liked it
Shelves: non-fiction, science-fact
If you’re already familiar with pop science books about diseases, this isn’t really going to surprise you any. It’s competently written, though at times the statistics are a little off (as another reviewer pointed out). I don’t agree that he’s too unduly alarmist, though; our current environmental and social conditions are just about perfect for a pandemic (viral or otherwise) to sweep through the world’s population. If you doubt it, The Great Influenza by John M. Barry should disabuse you of that notion, rapidly. And our world is more interconnected now, not less.
I hoped that this might be a little more in depth, given Wolfe being a biologist and all, but there’s nothing that really elevates it above other pop science books available. It’s honestly rather forgettable.
Reviewed for The Bibliophibian. (less)
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Feb 01, 2019Michelle rated it liked it
Shelves: 3-stars-or-less, insightful-read, read-in-2019
For those of us who are concerned about infectious diseases, pandemics, and their possible impact on the future, but don’t have a degree in virology, the author provides information in an easily understood manner. And while the name-dropping and personal accomplishments woven throughout may come across as a little braggy, they can also serve as reminders to the reader of the author’s first-hand experience and qualifications on the subject that garnered him invitations to work with so many experts in the field. (less)
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May 21, 2016Dawn rated it really liked it
Get our your Germ-X because there is a Viral Storm coming and we're all toast!
This book details how viruses evolve and adapt to overcome our fragile immune systems. The author posits it is only a matter of time before the ultimate virus comes along that will wipe out millions of people worldwide. Cheery thought, huh? The book is very interesting and does make for compelling, if not euphoric, reading. So go wash your hands and read up!
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Oct 15, 2012Tim rated it it was amazing
Loved this book, how it combined the science and the investigations of the diseases. While there is definitely a scary part of this story, there is also a promising part too. A dedicated core of health professionals worldwide is working 24/7 to protect us. They are learning more about past and future diseases and how they transfer between humans and animals.
The writing was engaging and the scientific explanation clear and help progress the story. Great pace.
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Oct 18, 2011Ben rated it it was amazing
While it does paint a scary picture of our modern situation as a species, it's not a fear-mongering book. It's respectable on how it covers and weighs the various possible sources of epidemic novelties, and does a good job of showing that reliance on bush meat due to poverty is the key enemy in regions of most-likely-origin, not culture.
Included a nice 101 on the viral nature of humanity, the bulk of mute/defunct viruses our DNA includes.
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Nov 06, 2012James Neve rated it really liked it
This book is currently scaring me to death.... I finally finished it. Thought-provoking... My only random question is why he makes little or no reference to sea-mammals and marine life in terms of bacteria and viruses... Maybe I forgot a chapter, or maybe that's another branch of research.....? I may visit his blog/website and ask.
Great book!
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3.77 · Rating details · 1,846 ratings · 200 reviews
Dynamic young Stanford biologist Nathan Wolfe reveals the surprising origins of the world's most deadly viruses, and how we can overcome catastrophic pandemics.
In The Viral Storm, award-winning biologist Nathan Wolfe tells the story of how viruses and human beings have evolved side by side through history; how deadly viruses like HIV, swine flu, and bird flu almost wiped ...more
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Hardcover, 320 pages
Published October 11th 2011 by Times Books (first published October 1st 2011)
ISBN
0805091947 (ISBN13: 9780805091946)
Edition Language
English
Literary Awards
Royal Society Science Book Prize Nominee for Science Books (2012)
Other Editions (13)
All Editions | Add a New Edition | Combine...Less DetailEdit Details
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Mar 24, 2013Kate rated it did not like it
An oversimplified view of infectious disease that lacked new information for anyone even moderately well-read in the field, I was disappointed by Nathan Wolfe's book. Wolfe attempted to follow the pattern so often used by infectious disease literature - open with a case study of a real person infected by the disease before transitioning into more depth information on the microbe. However, the opening anecdotes frequently ended up being unconnected to the rest of the chapter. Wolfe then failed to offer any in-depth information on whatever subject he was attempting to cover, relying instead on sweeping generalizations that failed to demonstrate any real understanding of infectious disease. I am not an expert in epidemiology; however, by merely being interested in the topic and having read other books in the field, Wolfe managed to provide me with absolutely no unique information.
Also detracting from this book was the frequent name-dropping of scientists that Wolfe has worked with. At time, the book read more like an autobiography/CV than an actual non-fiction work. I, as the reader, never learned about the research these people were doing, nor how it impacted the field (although I did learn things such as the name of their pets and how Wolfe met them).
If you're looking for a good book about disease, this isn't it. Try someone like Laurie Garret, who demonstrates a thorough understanding of the field of infectious disease AND has strong writing ability. Wolfe apparently lacks both.
Not worth the money or the time. (less)
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Feb 23, 2012Jenny Brown rated it did not like it
It sounds like Wolfe has done some interesting research and is working hard to prevent a new viral pandemic, but if you want the details you'll have to look elsewhere, because this poorly edited, badly written book won't give them to you.
Most chapters start with a punchy description of some poor schnook dying of a viral disease, but we learn almost nothing else about that disease and the rest of the chapter gives us only vague dumbed down overview of some topic that, if you have read anything published in the popular science press about infection over the past five years you've already read about in far more detail elsewhere.
The author drops the names of supposedly important researchers he's worked with around the world, without giving us any substantive description of those researchers or their research. Many are described as "incredibly" this or that. The flatness of the prose kept reminding me of freshman college papers I'd graded years ago.
But this wasn't a paper by an inarticulate college freshman. It was an expensive book by someone who is hyped to the skies on the cover flap so I expected to learn something. Alas, with each chapter I read my frustration grew, as Wolfe introduced topic after topic that I would have liked to learn something about, only to drop it after a few paragraphs so he could introduce some other topic he'd drop latter.
The only positive thing I can say about this book is that it is really clear that, unlike many books by science notables, it clearly wasn't ghosted. There is no trace that a professional writer had any hand in writing this dull, repetitive, uninformative book.
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Feb 14, 2020Ericka Clouther rated it really liked it
Shelves: nonfiction, science, history, health, medicine, biology, 2010s, author-male, pandemic, 0-borrowed
It's a bit disorganized for me, and considering how interested (read: worried) I am in this topic, I found it a bit dull. However, the tidbits I learned here and there about pandemic viruses in general and specific viruses in particular, I think it was well worth my time to read. The book had some particularly interesting facts regarding the AIDS virus and the Nipah virus (from bats to pigs to people). The connection between pandemics and eating meat, in general, is interesting. I've read before about Toxoplasma Gondii, but it's so crazy, it never disappoints, and I was interested in the new hypothesis about cat hoarders potentially being infected- why is that so hard to find out for sure though? I've read before about helpful bacteria, particularly gut bacteria, but this is the first I've heard of potentially helpful viruses. Finally, I thought it was interesting that Nathan Wolfe's data collection dreams (for preventing pandemics) are precisely Edward Snowden's nightmares. There seem to be many sides to the data debate, not just two. (less)
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Sep 19, 2016Donna rated it liked it
Shelves: non-fiction
I wanted to read this because it seemed relevant considering recent headlines. When I started this book, I thought this was not for me.....it was way too scientific and even though I like research, it just wasn't meaning anything to me. It reminded me of a bad college lecture. But once I settled into the rigor of this book, I actually started thinking that it was interesting. I enjoyed the connections the author was making as he linked so many things to viruses, their development and the spreading of them .... urbanization being the fastest way of sharing illness. I may be a book geek, but I am by no means a science geek, so overall, I liked this. 3 stars. (less)
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Jan 19, 2012Andy rated it did not like it
This is alarmist baloney. The author either doesn't know what he's talking about or else is deliberately misleading the reader.
Right from the start, for example, on page 9, he writes "H5N1 is important because it kills remarkably effectively. The virus's case fatality rate, or the percentage of infected individuals that die, is around 60 percent. For a microbe, that's incredibly deadly."
The reason this statement is so incredible is because it's not true.
First of all, he has the wrong definition of "case fatality rate." Case fatality generally refers to how many people die among those who are sick in the hospital. It is not the same thing as the "percentage of infected individuals that die" because not everyone infected gets sick, let alone sick enough to be in the hospital. The first number is like looking at how many deaths there are on a cruise ship that has crashed and sunk. The second is like looking at how likely you are to die if you ever go on a cruise.
The percentage of infected individuals that die from H5N1 is nowhere near 60%. In fact, it is not known because no one has ever published the necessary studies, but based on the best available data from the CDC it is closer to 0% than to 60%. If you look up the most cited paper on the topic (available free at http://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/N...) you can see that it says "The frequencies of human infection have not been determined, and seroprevalence studies are urgently needed." The international experts writing the paper make a clear distinction between case fatality and death-to-infection-ratio.
If this guy messes up the most basic concepts and facts about infectious diseases, I don't think he should be considered an expert on the topic of pandemics. (less)
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Oct 02, 2014Betsy Ashton rated it really liked it
Nathan Wolfe's The Viral Storm should be required reading for everyone talking or worrying hysterically about the current Ebola outbreak. An internationally recognized expert in the fields of viral forecasting, immunology, infectious diseases and human biology, Dr. Wolfe's book reads like a primer rather than a text book. His language is approachable for all readers.
He breaks down how viruses, both good and evil, developed alongside humans. He tracks the history of viruses that are benign. We need them in our bodies to process food and protect us from the evil viruses.
His discussions on how deadly viruses move from animal hosts to human hosts are the stuff of thrillers. Some, he points out, infect an individual and kill it, thereby stopping the transmission. Others, like HIV, swine flu and bird flu, are transmitted from human to human. Some,like Ebola and HIV, can only be transmitted through contact with bodily fluids. Others, swine and bird flu, are actually more dangerous because they easily pass through the human population by droplets in the air.
I bought this book for research for a mystery I'm writing. The book works on that dimension. More importantly, it works as an educational work that takes the hysteria out of pandemics by talking calmly about what these viruses are, how they are transmitted and how they can be forecast at the beginning of an outbreak before it becomes an epidemic or, worse, a pandemic.
I urge anyone interested in learning about illnesses to read this book. You will be better informed. Dr. Wolfe's journey is mankind's. (less)
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Nov 14, 2011Molly rated it really liked it
This is a good, easy to read overview of the science of viruses - it doesn't match the page-turning quality of Richard Preston's the Hot Zone, but what does? Nathan Wolf focuses on the science, rather than the stories, of tracking viruses and viral diseases and gives you the basics: what viruses are, how they infect humans (by way of birds and mammals), how viruses extend their range and how he and other scientists are working to catch the next viral epidemic before it wreaks havoc. That section was particularly interesting - the use of cell phones, twitter, and our digital habits to pin point when illnesses break out. But it's all fascinating and the book is a page-turner in its own way. I was never bored. (less)
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Feb 01, 2012Meg rated it it was amazing
Shelves: adult
This is one of the best non-fiction science books I have read. Nathan Wolfe, a biologist, though I think virologist would be more accurate, takes us into the world of viruses and their implications for humanity. His steady pace and even-handed way of presenting the facts makes this a very readable book for a novice such as myself. His explanations of how viruses function, react to one another, mutate, and harness the will of their hosts are easily understandable without being overly simplistic. It was totally engrossing from start to finish. (less)
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Jan 09, 2012Betsy Curlin rated it it was ok
This book seemed more focused on singing the praises of the author and his organization than on actually discussing viruses and their potential consequences.
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Sep 30, 2014Gary Beauregard Bottomley rated it liked it · review of another edition
The author gives a fairly good look at how Virologist think and see the world. He'll explain in general terms how they see the world and what kind of work they do. I would strongly recommend this book for anyone who thinks they might want to enter the field or for those who have not read any other books on similar topics.
It's obvious to me that the author knows a whole lot more about the subject, but in order to keep the book interesting for the widest possible audience he usually only explains the field in the most general terms.
For me, I wish the author would have written a more detailed book and my expectations weren't met. (less)
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Jan 14, 2012Amy rated it it was ok
Shelves: non-fiction, health-and-wellness
Less provocative than the title would lead you to believe, this book basically is a primer for the microbial world and how viruses jump from one species to another and within species. Probably more fun than your microbiology textbook, laced with anecdotes about chimp research in Africa, etc., but not for those looking for an exciting read about why bird flu will kill us all.
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Aug 10, 2014Rossdavidh rated it liked it
Shelves: black
Subtitle: The Dawn of a New Pandemic Age.
So, sometimes I am a bit concerned about the fact that I've been reading a bunch of books about disease and plague lately. But, you know, they're good, and part of why is that the history of disease is a kind of shadow history of the humans who harbor them. Just as the Black Death couldn't have happened if there hadn't been links (economic, cultural, and military) between Asia and Europe, and the conquest of the New World by the Old couldn't have happened if the germ arsenals on either side had been more evenly matched, the study of the new pandemics that threaten us is a good way of viewing the modern world. The perspective it offers is the right balance of familiar and unfamiliar, to be both interesting and disturbing.
The author of this book, Nathan Wolfe, has a dream, and this book is essentially his attempt to transfer that vision to the reader. Oh, yes, there's lots of science and history thrown in there, but that's mostly just because he's stuffed his brain full of so much of it that he can hardly avoid talking about it. No, what really drove him to write this book, I think, is the desire to will into existence a sort of pandemic Distant Early Warning system. He cannot do this alone, knowledgeable as he is, so he must convince enough of the rest of the world to give him the resources to do it.
To explain what such as system would look like, and why it would look that way, he has to give us some background. What is a pandemic? Where do they come from? How do they get from there to here? How can they be detected? What good would having an early warning do? Each of these questions takes some background, and some exposition, and we are fortunate that Wolfe is a skilled enough writer and storyteller to give us all of this in the right size pieces, packaged the right way, so that the very real human toll of disease isn't lost in a mass of numbers and proclamations of impending doom.
So, for example, when he tells us about where H5N1 (aka "bird flu") was first detected, he tells us that the first victim was a six-year old boy in Thailand, but he also tells us that he "loved riding his bicycle, climbing trees, and playing with his plastic toy Dalmatian that pulled three puppies in tiny brown wagons as it barked mechanically." He tells us about the farm that the boy, Kaptan, lived on, his father's payment of $35 (a large sum for a rice farmer in Thailand) to get an ambulance to transfer him to Bangkok in the hope that he could get better care there, and includes a picture of Kaptan's older brother at the funeral, holding his picture. Wolfe puts details like this throughout the book, about not only the early victims, but also the researchers he works with who go into remote areas in Asia, Africa, and elsewhere to collect information on the movements of the enemy.
And that, in essence, is what modern pandemics have to teach us about the modern world. It is easy to get the impression that the world we live in is one in which the action is in North America, western Europe, and a few other relatively wealthy areas like Japan, plus a few hot spots like the Middle East with the right combination of political unrest and natural resources to get and keep our attention. This book reminds us that when the desparately poor of inland sub-saharan Africa use new logging roads (paid for in order to get lumber for the west, mostly), to find and butcher chimpanzees, we may not hear about it but that doesn't mean it won't affect us (see HIV, Ebola, etc.). If live animal markets in southeast Asia keep different species in close contact, one cage stacked atop another so that they pass microbes along with their feces from one layer down to the next, we may not like to hear about it but the influenza viruses that pass from chicken to pig to human will find us wherever on the globe we are.
Globalization isn't just a way to exchange western goods for lumber and rare earth metals; it's also a way to quickly and efficiently pass microbes of any sort that can live in humans, from that economic periphery back to New York, Tokyo, and London. We are, as a species, almost perfectly designed to suffer from pandemics, and Wolfe shows us many of the reasons why:
1) for reason or reasons still debated, our species experienced (tens of thousands of years ago) a "bottleneck", where our total population was as little as several thousand individuals. With it, we lost a great deal of the microbial diversity that lived inside us as a species. Like the Native Americans learned to their sorrow when the (more microbially diverse) Europeans showed up, if you live with fewer kinds of microbes, your immune system is relatively naive.
2) we, as a species, just love getting close to other animal species. Whether as pets, farm labor, or food sources, we put ourselves in a position to be exposed to the blood (and microbes) of a great variety of other species. Occasionally, those microbes will hit on a way of jumping the gap, and living in us as well.
3) the last few hundred years has seen an ever-accelerating expansion of humans into every corner of the globe, and every ecosystem, finding every possible source of alien (to our species) microbes we can. The people we send to do the dirty work are usually poor, without the money or time for modern hygiene or medical care, and this gives those microbes that jump the gap a relatively hospitable environment in which to acclimate to our species.
4) in the last fifty years, air travel has knit us together in one vast network. The bubonic plague reached Europe by boat, and took months to spread from country to country thereafter, but if such a plague came today, it would reach every continent on the planet within 72 hours or less.
Wolfe's idea, which he has begun to make into a reality, is to look for microbes where they come from, in the places where they are most likely to jump from the species we hunt, to the poorest Third World hunters and farmers who will catch them. Then, by identifying quickly which ones have the potential to wreak havoc worldwide, we could in theory send healthcare resources to the origin, helping the people there survive the incipient pandemic, so that it never evolves the ability to spread further.
I don't know if Wolfe's vision is one that can realistically be achieved. In many ways it sounds like climate change, terrorism, and other modern threats, caused by events in so many different parts of the world that we would need the ability to coordinate globally in order to deal with the problem. Our track record on that is not great, and I wonder if the problem is not so much in our inability to act with a united front, as in our inability to see that globalization is putting us at risk of dangers which we have no mechanisms for facing.
Wolfe, however, is nothing if not an optimist. He is a believer in the power of science, technology, and medicine to find a way. He writes with a clear sympathy for the many poor people who stand first in the path of the oncoming "viral storm", and has an obvious desire to be given the resources to help them (and thus help us). Whether you share his optimism or not, his analysis of the dangers we face is clearly written, informative, and carries enough personal passion to make the reader care. Wolfe is like the best teacher you had in high school, who taught his or her topic with such sincere enthusiasm for it that you loved the class whether you cared about that topic when you began it or not. Wolfe is a writer, thinker, and scientist to watch; we will hear from him again. Let's hope it's for his next book, instead of him testifying before Congress that if they would only fund science properly, maybe next time it could help protect us. (less)
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Dec 12, 2011Tessa in North Florida rated it it was amazing
Shelves: nonfiction, disease, nature-science
Not all scientists can write. Stanford visiting professor Nathan Wolfe can and does a superb job. Concepts which have been difficult for others to explain flow easily from Wolfe's pen. He brings us up-to-date and shares fascinating situations which show just how complex our world has become.
One of the most important concepts to take away from the book is that there is probably no single disease host or reservoir for any particular disease, as was previously thought. Rather, all species have a ...more
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Jun 14, 2017Jami rated it liked it
Shelves: audible-books, non-fiction
This book was easy to follow and understand, so it is good for its intended general audience. I do have to say it was dry in some spots, though. Many reviewers who already have knowledge in this field have panned the book for its simplicity and lack of new information, but that is not the target audience. There needs to be books at this level for people like me, who want a general understanding of the subject matter; the experts can get their information from peer reviewed articles in scientific journals.
As for the book itself, there were some interesting parts. I never thought much about viruses other than they are pesky things that make people sick. However, I was fascinated to learn that viruses actually time their release (hence the reason they lie dormant at times) and transmission passage to enhance their success at continuing its life cycle and ensure the success of their offspring. Its actually a bit chilling to think of them in that way, like little villains living in your body going "aha, the perfect time for spreading myself around is here!" The symptoms of some viruses, such as coughing, sneezing, etc., are designed to make sure that they are spread and continue to survive.
The most chilling part of this book for me was when the author talks about microbes that keep him awake at night. This is a case of knowing too much; ignorance can be bliss at times. He knows what potential there is for new viruses to emerge, as well as bio terror or bio error, and I imagine that knowledge can be pretty darn scary.
The last section was fascinating in terms of using cell phone data to pinpoint where natural disaster events are occurring as well as internet search terms to determine if pandemics are going to be occurring. The prospect of a pandemic of these new super bugs is scary, but maybe with the forecasting techniques the author describes, it can be controlled. (less)
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Oct 18, 2012Eric Jay Sonnenschein rated it really liked it
The Viral Storm is a fast, informative overview of the human interaction with microbes and infectious diseases. It is a good book to start with if you are interested in epidemiology and the scary possibility of pandemics. Anyone who has kept abreast of the various outbreaks in the past quarter-century will be familiar with much of this information, eg. HIV, Ebola, Avian flu, SARS, etc. but there is also much that is new and interesting, for instance, the appearance of Monkeypox in the remote forests of central Africa.
Nathan Wolfe is a biologist with extensive experience in virology. He is the medical counterpart of the tornado chasers. While he is not a physician, he has a passion for pandemics and has been in many "hot spots" tracking contagions we should be grateful to know little about. Wolfe writes in an anecdotal and personal style. His writing is not particularly "tight." It is full of obvious repetitions, and autobiographical asides, which can be annoying because the eager reader senses that the pages could be better filled with more detailed information about the subject.
Within the genre of non-fiction narrative about the pathogenesis and social impact of contagious diseases, Jared Diamond's book, Guns, Germs and Steel is much better written. However, Diamond is more interested in the historical impact of diseases and specifically to how they contributed to conquest than to how these microbes "jump" from one species to another and spread.
Because microbes and diseases still seem so alien to us, and are so potentially lethal, they hold the same power over our magination as monsters and dangerous animals. For this reason, medical narratives (but not clinical journal articles on which they are based, which are too technical to be accessible to most readers), will continue to entertain readers.
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Feb 04, 2018Nikki rated it liked it
Shelves: non-fiction, science-fact
If you’re already familiar with pop science books about diseases, this isn’t really going to surprise you any. It’s competently written, though at times the statistics are a little off (as another reviewer pointed out). I don’t agree that he’s too unduly alarmist, though; our current environmental and social conditions are just about perfect for a pandemic (viral or otherwise) to sweep through the world’s population. If you doubt it, The Great Influenza by John M. Barry should disabuse you of that notion, rapidly. And our world is more interconnected now, not less.
I hoped that this might be a little more in depth, given Wolfe being a biologist and all, but there’s nothing that really elevates it above other pop science books available. It’s honestly rather forgettable.
Reviewed for The Bibliophibian. (less)
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Feb 01, 2019Michelle rated it liked it
Shelves: 3-stars-or-less, insightful-read, read-in-2019
For those of us who are concerned about infectious diseases, pandemics, and their possible impact on the future, but don’t have a degree in virology, the author provides information in an easily understood manner. And while the name-dropping and personal accomplishments woven throughout may come across as a little braggy, they can also serve as reminders to the reader of the author’s first-hand experience and qualifications on the subject that garnered him invitations to work with so many experts in the field. (less)
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May 21, 2016Dawn rated it really liked it
Get our your Germ-X because there is a Viral Storm coming and we're all toast!
This book details how viruses evolve and adapt to overcome our fragile immune systems. The author posits it is only a matter of time before the ultimate virus comes along that will wipe out millions of people worldwide. Cheery thought, huh? The book is very interesting and does make for compelling, if not euphoric, reading. So go wash your hands and read up!
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Oct 15, 2012Tim rated it it was amazing
Loved this book, how it combined the science and the investigations of the diseases. While there is definitely a scary part of this story, there is also a promising part too. A dedicated core of health professionals worldwide is working 24/7 to protect us. They are learning more about past and future diseases and how they transfer between humans and animals.
The writing was engaging and the scientific explanation clear and help progress the story. Great pace.
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Oct 18, 2011Ben rated it it was amazing
While it does paint a scary picture of our modern situation as a species, it's not a fear-mongering book. It's respectable on how it covers and weighs the various possible sources of epidemic novelties, and does a good job of showing that reliance on bush meat due to poverty is the key enemy in regions of most-likely-origin, not culture.
Included a nice 101 on the viral nature of humanity, the bulk of mute/defunct viruses our DNA includes.
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Nov 06, 2012James Neve rated it really liked it
This book is currently scaring me to death.... I finally finished it. Thought-provoking... My only random question is why he makes little or no reference to sea-mammals and marine life in terms of bacteria and viruses... Maybe I forgot a chapter, or maybe that's another branch of research.....? I may visit his blog/website and ask.
Great book!
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Top international reviews
AReader
Full of fascinating information
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 18 March 2020
Verified Purchase
I am reviewing this during the coronavirus epidemic in 2020. It is extremely informative and full of information which is still relevant. I have also read Spillover, and this is not as much of a thriller, but it is well written and absolutely riveting.
Del
A vision for the future
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 19 May 2014
Verified Purchase
I enjoyed this, although it wasn't quite what I expected.
The examination of how pandemics occur, and how little stands between us and the next, was fascinating, and I applaud the author's vision of a future in which, by using modern technology and advanced disease surveillance in animals and humans, we are able to predict, and stop, such outbreaks before they take hold.
Surely that is something public health should be striving for!
The examination of how pandemics occur, and how little stands between us and the next, was fascinating, and I applaud the author's vision of a future in which, by using modern technology and advanced disease surveillance in animals and humans, we are able to predict, and stop, such outbreaks before they take hold.
Surely that is something public health should be striving for!
Kindler
Excellent
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 3 April 2020
Verified Purchase
Excellent read
therese collie
We were warned
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 5 April 2020
Verified Purchase
Interesting and accessible read on microbes and pandemic preparedness. Hopefully his wish for this global “control room” might happen sooner than later.
Mr. R. G. A. Thomas
Excellently informative
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 19 April 2013
Verified Purchase
Absolutely chock full of new information. A page turner ... from the start it builds and keeps you going to find out the ultimate truth, the really important information about viruses and humans .... but in the end .... peters out.
