Skip to content
Register Sign in Wishlist

The Origins of AIDS

2nd Edition

£20.00

  • Date Published: January 2021
  • availability: In stock
  • format: Paperback
  • isbn: 9781108720397

£ 20.00
Paperback

Add to cart Add to wishlist

Other available formats:
Hardback, eBook


Looking for an inspection copy?

This title is not currently available on inspection

Description
Product filter button
Description
Contents
Resources
Courses
About the Authors
  • It is now forty years since the discovery of AIDS, but its origins continue to puzzle doctors, scientists and patients. Inspired by his own experiences working as a physician in a bush hospital in Zaire, Jacques Pépin looks back to the early twentieth-century events in central Africa that triggered the emergence of HIV/AIDS and traces its subsequent development into the most dramatic and destructive epidemic of modern times. He shows how the disease was first transmitted from chimpanzees to man and then how military campaigns, urbanisation, prostitution and large-scale colonial medical interventions intended to eradicate tropical diseases combined to disastrous effect to fuel the spread of the virus from its origins in Léopoldville to the rest of Africa, the Caribbean and ultimately worldwide. This is an essential perspective on HIV/AIDS and on the lessons that must be learned as the world faces another pandemic.

    • This revised and updated edition incorporates nearly a decade's worth of new research on AIDS
    • Offers a unique combination of epidemiology and history in tracing the origins and amplification of AIDS within Africa and then worldwide
    • Explains the complex routes of the virus and how the extension of World War I to Africa might have allowed HIV to make its fateful journey from Southeast Cameroon to Léopoldville
    Read more

    Reviews & endorsements

    'Superb ... Pépin rightly argues that, apart from social factors promoting HIV spread, inherent properties of the virus must determine its fitness to become pandemic. He also provides the best analysis I have read of the declining HIV-2 epidemic in West Africa.' Nature

    'Extensively referenced, [this] well-written book reads like a detective story, while at the same time providing a didactic introduction to epidemiology and evolutionary genetics. As far as the origins of AIDS are concerned, unless some completely new evidence emerges, it will be difficult to come up with a better explanation than Pepin's.' Science

    'A remarkable feat … works out the most likely path the virus took during the years it left almost no tracks'. The New York Times

    'An impressive feat of scientific scholarship … absorbing throughout, interweaving quantitative data with historical narrative and lively biographies.' The Lancet

    'A model study of epidemiology, microbiology, genetics, and social and cultural history … The Origins of AIDS bears brilliant witness to the costs of living in a world plagued by emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases'. The New Republic

    'This is scientific history at its most compelling … He writes with grace and feeling, and makes accessible the scientific and clinical issues. Above all, he comes across as a humane and caring doctor. This is a major contribution to our understanding of the scourge that has defined our times.' The Times Literary Supplement

    'This book takes on a journalistic quality, supported by solid evidence including maps, illustrations, graphs, etc. Such a precise analysis is more necessary than ever as the search for the origin of the recent COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated. Abundance and accuracy of information, careful analysis, and clear and fluid presentation together with a deep knowledge of the topic are more welcome than ever - not only for the understanding of AIDS, but also for the reaffirmation of the value of science in a time when its benefits to society are so widely contested.' Alain Touwaide, Doody's Reviews

    See more reviews

    Customer reviews

    Not yet reviewed

    Be the first to review

    Review was not posted due to profanity

    ×

    , create a review

    (If you're not , sign out)

    Please enter the right captcha value
    Please enter a star rating.
    Your review must be a minimum of 12 words.

    How do you rate this item?

    ×

    Product details

    • Edition: 2nd Edition
    • Date Published: January 2021
    • format: Paperback
    • isbn: 9781108720397
    • length: 392 pages
    • dimensions: 228 x 152 x 19 mm
    • weight: 0.65kg
    • availability: In stock
  • Table of Contents

    Introduction
    1. Out of Africa
    2. The Source
    3. The Timing
    4. The Cut Hunter
    5. The Scramble for Central Africa
    6. Tropical Boom Towns
    7. The Oldest Profession
    8. Injections and the Transmission of Viruses
    9. The Legacies of French Colonial Medicine
    10. The Legacies of Belgian Tropical Medicine
    11. The Other Human Immunodeficiency Viruses
    12. From the Congo to the Caribbean
    13. The Blood Trade
    14. A Long Journey
    15. Globalisation
    16. A False Villain, a Genuine Hero
    17. Epilogue

  • Author

    Jacques Pépin, Université de Sherbrooke, Canada
    Jacques Pépin is Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases at Université de Sherbrooke, Canada. He has conducted research on infectious diseases in sixteen African countries.

Related Books

also by this author

Sorry, this resource is locked

Please register or sign in to request access. If you are having problems accessing these resources please email lecturers@cambridge.org

Register Sign in
Please note that this file is password protected. You will be asked to input your password on the next screen.

» Proceed

You are now leaving the Cambridge University Press website. Your eBook purchase and download will be completed by our partner www.ebooks.com. Please see the permission section of the www.ebooks.com catalogue page for details of the print & copy limits on our eBooks.

Continue ×

Continue ×

Continue ×
warning icon

Turn stock notifications on?

You must be signed in to your Cambridge account to turn product stock notifications on or off.

Sign in Create a Cambridge account arrow icon
×

Find content that relates to you

Join us online

This site uses cookies to improve your experience. Read more Close

Are you sure you want to delete your account?

This cannot be undone.

Cancel

Thank you for your feedback which will help us improve our service.

If you requested a response, we will make sure to get back to you shortly.

×
Please fill in the required fields in your feedback submission.
×