Deadly Feasts: Tracking the Secrets of a Terrifying New Plague

Rating:
Summary: 90's documentary version of Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle"
Review: As a result of the publication of "The Jungle" in 1906, the Pure Food and Drug Act was passed in the US in the midst of public outcry. The book also singlehandedly changed the course of America's meat consumption habits for several generations. Well, Richard Rhodes has done it in my household--and I, for one, will never look at a piece of beef in the same way again. I have been given a healthy dose of skepticism in the chronicling of the treatment of herds of cattle in Britain affected with various TSE's. In a capitalistic world, where the bottom line rests with profits and futures, how could we expect the industry to do the "right" thing and sacrifice massive profits instead of human life? This is a gripping book full of the human vagaries present in the world of research. Some high school student will later become a prize-winning researcher after having been smitten by it. (If she can get through the first chapter "I Eat You."

Rating:
Summary: Excellent documentary but somewhat unprofessional
Review: Deadly feasts is an extroardinary, readable, tale anyone interested in public health, medicine, and biology will enjoy reading. The tale is especially relevant now because of the spread of mad cow disease to the United States. I urge people to read this book because it will assist them in understanding the current risks facing the U.S. food supply. I also recommend the book because it is fascinating. Prion diseases are 100% lethal and transmitted in a way that defies conventional wisdom and may not be completely understood to this day.

Mr. Rhodes admirably reports that controversy remains regarding the method of transmission of the transmissible spongiform encephalopathies. However, I think he goes over the deep end by personally attacking/criticizing the activities of Dr. Pruisner--one of the nobel prize recipients who helped elucidate the "carrier" of prion diseases. If Dr. Prusiner intentionally tried to supress publication of alternative theories, then he has certainly violated good scientific practice. But, as Richard Feynman points out, "nature cannot be fooled," and the truth will eventually emerge regardless of what Dr. Prusiner thinks or does. Mr. Rhodes goes to the point of criticizing Dr. Prusiner for passionately advocating his own theory--maybe at the expense of delaying our arrival at the ultimate truth. We don't know what the ultimate truth is though (Dr. Prusiner may be correct) and science is a market place of ideas that eventually leads to that truth. I think Dr. Prusiner has the right to advocate his own theories, providing he reports his data accurately and fully.

A much more reprehensible matter in the book is entirely glossed over. While Dr. Prusiner's behavior is punished for pages and pages, hardly a sentence is written about the alleged sexual misconduct of another prominent nobel prize winning recipient who helped elucidate the nature of prion diseases. When placed side by side, the alleged immoral behavior of Dr. Prusiner pales in comparison to that of this other character. Mr Rhodes' fixation on criticizing Dr. Prusiner, but his comparative disregard for this other character suggests an unprofessional bias engrained in this book.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent documentary but somewhat unprofessional
Review: Deadly feasts is an extroardinary, readable, tale anyone interested in public health, medicine, and biology will enjoy reading. The tale is especially relevant now because of the spread of mad cow disease to the United States. I urge people to read this book because it will assist them in understanding the current risks facing the U.S. food supply. I also recommend the book because it is fascinating. Prion diseases are 100% lethal and transmitted in a way that defies conventional wisdom and may not be completely understood to this day.

Mr. Rhodes admirably reports that controversy remains regarding the method of transmission of the transmissible spongiform encephalopathies. However, I think he goes over the deep end by personally attacking/criticizing the activities of Dr. Pruisner--one of the nobel prize recipients who helped elucidate the "carrier" of prion diseases. If Dr. Prusiner intentionally tried to supress publication of alternative theories, then he has certainly violated good scientific practice. But, as Richard Feynman points out, "nature cannot be fooled," and the truth will eventually emerge regardless of what Dr. Prusiner thinks or does. Mr. Rhodes goes to the point of criticizing Dr. Prusiner for passionately advocating his own theory--maybe at the expense of delaying our arrival at the ultimate truth. We don't know what the ultimate truth is though (Dr. Prusiner may be correct) and science is a market place of ideas that eventually leads to that truth. I think Dr. Prusiner has the right to advocate his own theories, providing he reports his data accurately and fully.

A much more reprehensible matter in the book is entirely glossed over. While Dr. Prusiner's behavior is punished for pages and pages, hardly a sentence is written about the alleged sexual misconduct of another prominent nobel prize winning recipient who helped elucidate the nature of prion diseases. When placed side by side, the alleged immoral behavior of Dr. Prusiner pales in comparison to that of this other character. Mr Rhodes' fixation on criticizing Dr. Prusiner, but his comparative disregard for this other character suggests an unprofessional bias engrained in this book.

Rating:
Summary: Engaging look at a scary set of diseases
Review: Deadly feasts: tracking the secrets of a terrifying new plague by Richard Rhodes is one scary book. It tracks the discovery of prions, the mishapen proteins responsible for mad cow disease, scrapie, and Creutzfeldt Jacob disease. Following human cannibals in the jungles of New Guinea in the fifties, bovine cannibals of the British Isles in the eighties, and the bizarre history of sheep scrapie from the 17th century on, Rhodes does a great job of presenting the history and discovery of this bizarre group of diseases. I especially enjoyed the characterizations of the scientists, from the Noble Laureate who so enjoyed the New Guinea that he often regretted rejoining civiliziation, yet brought thirty natives back to the USA and helped them through school, to the hyper-competitive scientist who named the molecules even though he wasn't quite certain what they were.

But this isn't just a story of scientific discovery. As the foreboding subtitle blares, Rhodes explores some of the scarier aspects of prions. These include spontaneous formation, responsible for the known early cases of Creutzfeldt Jacob disease, trans-species infection, including mad cow disease and scrapie, the long long incubation period and lack of immune system response, and hardiness of the disease. One scary factoid: a scientist took a sample of scrapie, froze it, baked it for an hour at 360 degrees (celsius), and was able to re-infect other animals from this sample.

For all the uneasiness this book inspires, it certainly doesn't offer any answers. A condemnation of industrial agriculture, a warning that it's unknown whether vegetarians are even safe, and a caution against using bone meal for your flower garden do not make a recipe for handling this issue. To be fair, it was printed in 1997--perhaps things are under control now.



Rating:
Summary: Thanks for your reviews--and a few corrections.
Review: Glad to see an ongoing debate on the issues I report in my book. "dseamon" (03/27/97) misreads my statement, though: the 700,000 BSE-infected cattle entered the human food supply over ten years, not annualy, so 2 percent is accurate. "YYYguise's" (04/11/97) review is deliberately misleading, borrowed in part from a review in the conservative rag "The Weekly Standard" (the ad hominem attack on my supposed preoccupation with cannibalism). It's true I didn't talk to USDA scientists (why would I want to do that? their activities and their views have been widely published). I interviewed all the leading specialists in the field of TSE studies with the exception of Stanley Prusiner, who chose not to talk to me--as Oliver Sacks authoritatively confirms in his recent enthusiastic New Yorker review. I also spoke with scientists at the FDA. It's not hype that Mad Cow disease is transmissible to humans: that's what British and French scientists have concluded about the 17 human deaths they've identified so far from a new form of CJD.

But I'm glad some reviewers noticed that the book is a medical detective story, filled with interesting characters. Carleton Gajdusek is preeminent among them. I would certainly defend the quality of his science. His admission of guilt on two charges of child molestation for sexual activity with two teenaged boys is indefensible, and I don't "defend" him in this matter, but I do report it.

Rating:
Summary: A beef against cows
Review: I couldn't help thinking of Richard Preston's "Hot Zone" while reading this book, although Deadly Feasts struck a slightly more horrific note given the fact that almost everybody has or does eat beef.

The book serves as an excellent primer on the dangers and consequences of modern food production and consumption; it also has an excellent chapter covering genetic theories underlying what's popularly called Mad Cow Disease.

More horror than a Stephen King novel; more facts than the Sunday Times; more fun than a barrel of quaranteened screaming African green monkeys.

Rating:
Summary: Great Science History Slumps into Political Scaremongering
Review: I enjoyed this book very much, until I got to the last chapter.

After a delightfully well-written history of the research into TSE diseases, Rhodes launches into a diatribe against those who distrust governmental regulation, singling out Newt Gingrich and the Contract With America for particular contumely.

To Rhodes, a suspicion of governmental regulation is not merely irresponsible, but downright immoral. Perhaps Rhodes has forgotten, in his zeal to save the potentially thousands of lives at risk from BSE, that hundreds of millions of lives have been lost in this century because people were insufficiently suspicious of yielding power to their governments. Perhaps he didn't notice that no amount of beef inspection could have foreseen or prevented the British BSE outbreak. Perhaps he doesn't realize that if a remedy were found for nvCJD, his beloved governmental regulations would keep the remedy out of the marketplace for a long time.

Overall, a worthwhile read. Just skip the last chapter.

Rating:
Summary: The politics of science
Review: I read this book years ago when still horrified at the infection of thousands of hemophiliacs with HIV. Feeling somewhat distrustful of the FDA, it seemed prudent to find out what this next big threat was all about. And now, with the first case of "mad cow disease" in the US, it seemed a good time to take another look.
Richard Rhodes takes a scientific approach to the evolution of prion borne diseases. He traces them back to cannibalistic rituals and we realize they are not new. The stories of the scientists that attempt to unravel the secrets behind prion borne illness are intriguing. We are led to realize that scientific discovery is big business. The brilliance and tenacity of these research scientists is revealed and while this book is not a pageturner like my favorite thrillers, it is gripping reading nonetheless. This is not a thriller, or science fiction--this is true stuff!! Rhodes doesn't sensationalize, but rather lays the facts out there for us to digest (no pun intended). If you really want to know what CJD is all about, this is the perfect place to start. You'll wind up knowing more than you probably wanted to. Should be required reading for all adults, highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: The politics of science
Review: I read this book years ago when still horrified at the infection of thousands of hemophiliacs with HIV. Feeling somewhat distrustful of the FDA, it seemed prudent to find out what this next big threat was all about. And now, with the first case of "mad cow disease" in the US, it seemed a good time to take another look.
Richard Rhodes takes a scientific approach to the evolution of prion borne diseases. He traces them back to cannibalistic rituals and we realize they are not new. The stories of the scientists that attempt to unravel the secrets behind prion borne illness are intriguing. We are led to realize that scientific discovery is big business. The brilliance and tenacity of these research scientists is revealed and while this book is not a pageturner like my favorite thrillers, it is gripping reading nonetheless. This is not a thriller, or science fiction--this is true stuff!! Rhodes doesn't sensationalize, but rather lays the facts out there for us to digest (no pun intended). If you really want to know what CJD is all about, this is the perfect place to start. You'll wind up knowing more than you probably wanted to. Should be required reading for all adults, highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Scarriest book I ever read and I am a Stephen King Fan!!!!
Review: I'll never be able to look at food the same way! If you are a die hard meat eater, I suggest steering clear of this book. I have never been so affected by an author's work as I was this one. Truly, truth is stranger than fiction!!