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Why Metaphor Matters
That's an incredible figure. Even if the WHO has missed it's mark by a factor of two, hundreds of millions of people have been infected. Coming across that statistic changed my perspective in a hurry. JoAnne Brown had the same awakening as she did her research. She gained a new appreciation, as will anyone who reads her book when it's published, of how profoundly sickness can shape history. She speaks of the "antibiotic interregnum" of the 1950s and 1960s, when people, Americans in particular, deluded themselves into thinking humankind would soon achieve "victory" over disease. No such luck. AIDS, tuberculosis, Ebola virus, and other infectious killers are nowhere near vanquished. It's a sobering realization.
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