How a Lifesaving Cure Was Nearly Lost—and Why It Will Rescue Us When Antibiotics Fail
By Lina Zeldovich
I’m very conflicted writing about this. It was a great
bit of history and well told, all about the persons and personalities that led
to the discovery and ultimate re-discovery of the bacteriophage. These are
viruses that prey on bacteria; when carefully cultured, purified, and tested,
they can be used therapeutically to great effect.
To sum up the mystery of “Nearly Lost”, I’ll briefly explain what the book is all about. They were discovered independently in several places, and used therapeutically to great effect in Eastern Europe. She spends much time writing about their champions and how the research proceeded. But in Western medicine, they were mostly discredited and ignored—antibiotics worked as well and were a lot easier to create. Until, of course, antibiotics stopped working.
It's a fascinating story and I only have a few complaints to share. (None of which should interfere with your enjoyment of this book) One, she tends to spend a lot of words on the love stories and female companions of the scientists who are the subjects of the book. I found that boring and mostly pointless. Two, there are an awful lot of episodes described that follow the same pattern: person gets an infection; person is at death’s door and nothing will help; patient’s family/doctor/lover insists on getting a bacteriophage treatment; patient experiences miraculous recovery.
Okay, once or twice is enough! It seems to repeat this over and over.
And third complain, the book seems to consistently downplay (and at first, ignore) the issue that bacteriophages, like any living thing, can mutate. And so can bacteria. So a treatment that once worked can stopped working, and also, even the most careful of scientific process can have unintended consequences. Toward the end of the book, these issues are mentioned. But then she’s back on her endless applause for the miracles of bacteriophages.
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