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Book Review
Yellow Jack—How Yellow Fever
Ravaged America and Walter Reed Discovered Its Deadly Secrets
John R. Pierce and James V. Writer
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Hoboken, New Jersey, 2005
ISBN: 0-471-47261-1
Pages: 278, Price: US $24.95
Suggested
citation for this article
Yellow Jack is a compelling and thorough narrative of one of the most
interesting chapters in medical history. The book, which is highly readable
even to those who may think they know this story, is based on a series
of articles written by one of the authors, John R. Pierce, for Stripe,
a publication of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Dr Pierce was a
colonel in the Army Medical Corps and recently retired after 30 years
of active duty service.
The first 5 chapters describe the introduction of yellow fever in North
America before 1900. Of particular interest is the chapter detailing events
of the 1793 outbreak in Philadelphia, and the efforts of Benjamin Rush
to treat patients and determine the specific cause. Chapter 6 compares
the roles played by Carlos Juan Finlay and George Miller Sternberg before
and during the work of the US Army Yellow Fever Board. Dr Finlay was a
Cuban physician who had theorized that mosquitoes transmitted the yellow
fever virus, while Sternberg, a US Army physician, claimed to have discovered
a bacterium that was the etiologic agent of yellow fever.
Most of the remaining 10 chapters primarily discuss the work of the US
Army Yellow Fever Board, led by Major Walter Reed. Yellow fever had ravaged
North America for >200 years, bringing death and economic ruin to several
major cities. Major Reed designed a series of simple experiments, using
human volunteers, which clearly showed that yellow fever was transmitted
only by the bite of infected mosquitoes and not by contaminated items
or "poison air." Although the story is familiar to some, the
authors present an exciting narrative with details not available elsewhere
in the literature. The periodic use of quotations from letters and original
sources is most welcome.
The book includes a useful Notes section and an extensive bibliography.
Additionally, 12 pages of photos and illustrations are provided, some
of which are not as clear as one might wish. Overall, however, this book
is a valuable addition to the literature on medical history. It will have
broad appeal to scientists and nonscientists alike because of the nature
of the story, the magnitude of the problem that was solved, and the easy-to-read
writing style of the authors. I recommend it highly.
Stanton Cope*
*Naval Institute for Dental and Biomedical Research, Great Lakes, Illinois,
USA
Suggested citation
for this article:
Cope S. Yellow jack—how
yellow fever ravaged America and Walter Reed discovered its deadly secrets
[book review]. Emerg Infect Dis[serial on the Internet]. 2005 Oct [date
cited]. Available from http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/EID/vol11no10/05-0958.htm
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