sbutton82 's review for:

The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History by John M. Barry

4.0

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First of all, I now have a new respect for the influenza virus, and will continue to get my Flu Shot yearly. With that said, the book has its good and bad moments. So, lets start with some of the good. Its written in a way that anyone can read it, you don't have to have a medical or scientific background to understand the story. I learned a lot not only about the influenza virus, but also epidemics and pandemics. Now for the bad. This story is extremly repetitive. I have read a few reviews stating how horrible this book was because it repeats itself so frequently. I started noticing it towards the end of the book, and was begning to get annoyed, but then I looked at it in another way. I have a medical background, and recently atteneded a discussion on health literacy. ON average for a patient to understand the importance of a diagnosis, test result, or life style change, it takes 3 times of hearing the same information before it really begins to sink in and they understand or take action. When I look at the book this way, I realized how important the infomration is. Not only is the author trying to tell the story of the 1918 influenza pandemic, but also to prevent it in the future. By repeating the death tolls and the mistakes that were made to prevent the spread of the disease, the reality that this could happen again begins to sink in.

Taking the good with the bad I would recommed this book to everyone.