Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #527519 in Books
• Published on: 2002-09-01
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .1 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 304 pages

From Library Journal
A political scientist and an expert on bio-weapons analysis, Tucker provides an engrossing look at the continuing debate over the destruction of smallpox. The author uses numerous interviews with key players to look at the political and social aspects of the disease. Although a brief history of smallpox is included, the strength of the book lies in the author's description of the process used to eradicate naturally occurring smallpox. Equally valuable is the last section that considers the pros and cons of destroying the laboratory stockpiles of the virus. Postponed several times, the elimination of the remaining virus is now set for 2002. Concern remains among experts that if smallpox were somehow reintroduced into society, the public health system would not be able to contain the disease. The potential viability of smallpox as a biological weapon is covered in reasonable depth. Light on technical language, this accessible book is highly recommended for all libraries. Tina Neville, Univ. of South Florida at St. Petersburg Lib.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Tucker, an expert in biological weapons, has a sense of both the detail and the broad sweep of history that helps him make the story of smallpox as disease and as weapon fascinating and frightening. He reveals that the deadly infection was used as a weapon in American colonial and revolutionary times as well as in the Civil War, and he devotes much of the book to the WHO smallpox eradication program, which freed the world of it in 1978. D. A. Henderson, a major participant in that program, demonstrated the toughness and persistence needed to face down powerful politicians and bring religious leaders to heel. Nationalism and economics have often played negative roles in the fight against smallpox; for instance, the shah of Iran kept an epidemic secret so that celebration of the two-thousand-five-hundredth anniversary of the Persian Empire wouldn't be overshadowed. Tucker describes in detail the long struggle over maintaining research stocks of the virus--an effort that rather leaves smallpox as a terrorist weapon looming threateningly over this well-written, thoroughly documented book. William Beatty
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