Monster At The Door

I’ve just finished reading The Monster at Our Door: The Global Threat of Avian Flu, a new book by urban critic Mike Davis. It’s a quick, excellent, and terrifying read. I think it’s the first popular book to focus specifically on the threat of the H5N1 flu virus. A quote that’s a good synopsis of his view:

In the face of the peril of avian influenza, as with HIV/AIDS earlier, world public health resources are organized rather like the lifeboats were on the Titanic: many of the first-class passengers and even some of the crew will drown because of the company’s skinflint lack of foresight; the poor Paddies in steerage, however, do not even have a single lifeboat between them, and thus, they are all doomed to swim in the icy waters.