Synopsis
Coining the word "ecodemics" to illustrate the links between epidemics of disease and larger processes of human mediated environmental change, Walters (journalism, U. of South Florida St. Petersburg) argues that human activities have been responsible for the exacerbation and even appearance of such diseases as Mad Cow Disease, AIDS, West Nile Virus, and Lyme Disease. Using a journalistic and anecdotal style, he describes the ecological factors that lead to the spread of disease, for example arguing that deforestation has lessened predator species that hunted deer and mice, animals that carry the ticks that spread Lyme Disease. Annotation ©2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
The New York Times
Dr. Walters shies away from proposing specific solutions, but Six Plagues suggests that the world needs nothing less than wholesale changes in the way we live -- what fuels we use, what food we eat and how it is raised, what wild animals we tolerate near us, even where we live.
But if Six Plagues does not offer explicit solutions, it persuasively raises the alarm. It draws compelling, even disturbing, connections between disease and forces as implacable as population growth, deforestation and modern lifestyles that consume fuel, meat and acreage at an ever-growing pace. — Richard Perez-Pena