Great Medical Disasters

Man’s activities have been tainted by disaster ever since the serpent first approached Eve in the garden—and the world of medicine is no exception. In this outrageous and strangely informative book, Richard Gordon explores some of history’s more bizarre medical disasters. He creates a catalog of mishaps including anthrax bombs on Gruinard Island, destroying mosquitoes in Panama, and Mary the cook who, in 1904, inadvertently spread typhoid across New York State. As the Bible so rightly says, “He that sinneth before his maker, let him fall into the hands of the physician.”