David R. (drambear) reviewed The Demon Under the Microscope: From Battlefield Hospitals to Nazi Labs, One Doctor's Heroic Search for the World's First Miracle Drug on + 19 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 1
Within the first fifty pages this book took it's place in my top ten non-fiction works. It includes history, science, biography and business wrapped together with clear writing. It a shock to see some of the usually fatal diseases our grandparents faced that have been all but forgotten. A world where a boil, insect bite, or cut finger could result in an ugly death. The author states that this is a book about "antibiotic" and he includes the sulfa drugs to be part of this class, rather than just those we usually consider an "antibiotic". In this the author is being a bit disingenuous, I suspect to help market his book. The book is about the sulfa drugs which proceeded what we today consider "antibiotics" and have been all but forgotten. The details of the discovery and use of "antibiotics" is fairly well known. I personally might have skipped a book subtitled "The Story of the Sulfa Drugs". I am so very happy the author said what he did.
