Reviewed by Rama Gaind.
By Dr Michael Mosley, Simon & Schuster, $19.99.
At a time when we are experiencing unprecedented anxiety and ambiguity as the world come to grips with the enduring effects of COVID-19, this ‘portrait of a serial killer’ is an informative outline of the Coronavirus epidemic.
According to Dr Mosley, an award-winning science journalist, the pandemic “represents the greatest health crisis of the last hundred years”.
This book charts the trajectory of a novel virus, from its emergence in China at the end of 2019 to its rapid worldwide spread. Based on the latest scientific discoveries, Dr Mosley provides a thorough understanding of the secrets of this Coronavirus, how it spreads, how it infects your body and how your immune system tries to fight back. With access to leading experts, he reports on the battle to find treatments and a safe and effective vaccine (ultimately, the only way to defeat the virus).
This book is about the race to create that vaccine. It is also a “distillation of what we currently know about SARS-CoV-2, how it spreads and how you can best protect yourself from being struck down”.
It’s not known how bad this pandemic will become or how long it will last. The name of the virus that sent the world into shutdown in 2020 – is a cunning enemy. “It’s a killer with a range of impressive superpowers, including the ability to travel amongst us, undetected, infect almost everyone it meets and then reproduce liberally, before jumping off in search of a new host.”
Two of our most effective weapons against the virus are physical distancing and using water and soap, which breaks down the fatty outer membrane that surrounds the short strand of COVID-19 RNA.
