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1-Page Summary of Smallpox
Overall Summary
When Plague Strikes: The Black Death, Smallpox, AIDS is a work of historical nonfiction by James Cross Giblin. It examines three major plague epidemics in world history and considers their effects on society. Giblin has written comic strips and plays as well as numerous award-winning books for young adults. He’s worked as an editor at Clarion Books before focusing on writing full-length works with the goal of providing accessible narratives to readers.
This book focuses on three major epidemics: the black death, smallpox, and AIDS. The author discusses each of these diseases in detail by looking at their origins and how they spread throughout history. He also looks at society’s reaction to each plague. After giving a detailed account of all three plagues, the author concludes with his thoughts about modern medicine and its future. He believes that antibiotic resistance will cause another epidemic in the future because we don’t have any new treatments for it yet.
Diseases are fascinating because they affect how we respond to them. For example, there was a disease called the Black Death in Medieval Europe that killed millions of people and created chaos in society. People responded by living with it and trying to find ways to survive while still maintaining their daily lives. Similarly, today’s diseases have similar effects on us as well but can be treated or prevented if we change our behavior accordingly.
Since When Plague Strikes is intended for a young adult audience, it covers the social, economic and political implications of each disease. It helps young adults develop knowledge by combining subjects like history and science to their understanding of epidemics and how they shaped medical advancement. Adults can also read this book for a quick overview of these complex epidemics to better understand how they affected society and medicine at the time
Plague begins in Athens and spreads quickly. Greek doctors had never seen a disease like this before, so they didn’t know how to treat it or stop the spread of the illness. The body count soon became unmanageable, livelihoods were destroyed, crime rates soared and families disappeared. As a result, Athens was never the same again.
When a disease is not treatable, we call it a plague. Giblin explains that there’s no difference between viral and bacterial infections in the way they spread, but some can be treated with antibiotics while others cannot.
As a result, whole crews died at sea if one sailor contracted the plague. The disease spread quickly and people were not prepared for it. The Black Death traveled across Europe and killed many people because they were not ready for it. It was carried by war and invading armies to new territories where it spread wildly. In addition, the doctors could only reflect on how unprepared they were when the Black Plague struck Europe.
The second part of When Plague Strikes begins in Ancient Egypt. Pharoah Ramses V dies suddenly, despite being healthy. At the time, people didn’t know what caused his death, but it was likely smallpox. Soon after his death, other Egyptians began dying from the same symptoms.
The smallpox rash is similar to the symptoms of syphilis. People didn’t know what caused it, but eventually they figured out that it was a virus. It took many years for scientists to find any treatment or cure for smallpox and people died from it because there wasn’t a cure yet.
The third part of the book examines AIDS, a disease that’s spread rapidly and reached epidemic levels. Scientists struggled to find any treatment for it, but promising vaccines now exist. While these vaccines are still unreliable, we haven’t tested them thoroughly yet, so Giblin is optimistic that we’ll find a cure one day.
