Quotes from The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance

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“In 1982 President Ronald Reagan called for a war on drugs: by 1990 more men were in federal prisons on drug charges alone than had comprised the entire 1980 federal prison population for all crimes combined.”
― quote from The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance


“In 1980 the Latin American nations collectively were receiving from their external creditors—major banks, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank—about $11 billion more than they were losing in capital transfers back to wealthy-nation interests. But by 1985 these nations would be losing $35 billion more a year in capital transfers to North America and Europe than they received in loans and investments.41”
― quote from The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance


“Only mosquito can save Nigeria. Only mosquito can save South Africa. Only mosquito can save Zimbabwe Only mosquito can save Namibia. Only mosquito can save Africa. Only malaria can save Africa. Only yellow fever can save Africa.”
― quote from The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance


“According to official Soviet statistics submitted to the World Health Organization in the 1970s, virtually every imaginable infectious disease was on the decline or had disappeared, thanks to communist policies. It was widely believed in international health circles at the time that these statistics were wholly fabricated. 9”
― quote from The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance


“Consider the difference in size between some of the very tiniest and the very largest creatures on Earth. A small bacterium weights as little as 0.00000000001 gram. A blue whale weighs about 100,000,000 grams. Yet a bacterium can kill a whale … . Such is the adaptability and versatility of microorganisms as compared with humans and other so-called “higher” organisms, that they will doubtless continue to colonise and alter the face of the Earth long after we and the rest of our cohabitants have left the stage forever. Microbes, not macrobes, rule the world. —Bernard Dixon, 1994”
― quote from The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance



“The city of Strasbourg alone savagely slew 16,000 of its Jewish residents, blaming them for spreading the Black Death.10”
― quote from The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance


“A new global iatrogenic form of malaria was emerging—“iatrogenic” meaning created as a result of medical treatment. In its well-meaning zeal to treat the world’s malaria scourge, humanity had created a new epidemic.”
― quote from The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance


“Besides, there wasn’t much the lab could tell a physician in 1940 that a well-trained, observant doctor couldn’t determine independently.”
― quote from The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance


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“Sosyeteymiş, toplummuş! Sen, herhalde kasten götürüyorsun beni bu sosyete ve toplumlara, orada olma isteğinden tümden kurtulmam için. Yaşam, ah güzel yaşam! Onu nerede aramalı? Aklın, kalbin ilgilerinde mi? Bütün bunların çevresinde döndüğü merkezi göster: öyle bir şey yok, derin bir şey, canlı bir şey yok. Bütün bunlar ölü, uyuyan insanlar, benden de kötü bu sosyete ve toplum üyeleri! Onları yaşamda sürükleyen şey ne? Bunlar yatmayıp her gün sinekler gibi, ileri geri uçuşuyorlar, ama ne için? Bir salona giriyorsun ve misafirlerin nasıl simetrik bir şekilde yerleştiğine, nasıl huzurlu ve derin düşüncelere dalmış bir şekilde kâğıt oynamaya oturduğuna şaşakalıyorsun. Diyecek bir şey yok, şanlı bir yaşam vazifesi! Hareket arayan bir akıl için mükemmel örnek! Bunlar ölü değil mi? Yaşamları boyunca oturup pineklemiyorlar mı? Neden ben evde yattığım ve aklımı valelerle, sineklerle bozmadığım için daha suçlu oluyormuşum?” “Yaşlı onların hepsi, bunu bin kez konuştuk,” dedi Ştoltz. “Daha yeni bir şeyin yok mu?” “Peki bizim iyi gençlerimiz, onlar ne yapıyor? Herhalde uyumuyor, Neva Bulvarı’nda geziniyor, dans ediyorlar? Her gün boş yere üst üste yığılan günler! Ama baksana, onlar gibi giyinmeyen, onların unvan ve adını taşımayanlara nasıl kibirle ve tarifsiz bir özgüvenle, küçümseyici bakışlarla bakıyorlar. Ve zavallılar kendilerinin kalabalıktan yüksekte olduğunu hayal ediyor: ‘Bizler, bizden başka kimsenin çalışmadığı yerlerde çalışırız; biz koltukların en ön sırasındayız, Knez N.’nin balosundayız, sadece bizi davet ettiler bu baloya’... Ama bir araya toplanınca da vahşiler gibi içip kavga ederler! Bunlar mı canlı, uyumayan insanlar? Hem sadece gençler de değil: yetişkinlere de bak. Bir araya geliyor, birbirlerini davet ediyorlar, ne büyük konukseverlik, ne iyilik, ne birbirlerine düşkünlük! Öğle yemeğinde, akşam yemeğinde görev gibi toplanıyorlar, neşesiz, soğuk bir halde, aşçılarıyla, salonlarıyla övünmek ve sonra da bıyık altından gülmek, birbirlerine çelme takmak için. Evvelsi gün, yemekten sonra orada bulunmayan ünlüleri karalamaya başladıkları zaman nereye bakacağımı bilemedim, masanın altına saklanmak istedim: ‘O aptal, bu rezil, diğeri hırsız, ötekisi komik’; sanki avlanıyorlar! Bunu söylerken bir de birbirlerine şöyle der gibi bakıyorlar: ‘Haydi çık sen dışarı, sıra sana da gelecek...’ Eğer bunlar öyleyse neden onlarla yan yana geliyorlar? Neden birbirlerinin elini böyle sertçe sıkıyorlar? Ne samimi bir gülüş, ne bir duygudaşlık ışıltısı! Gösterişli unvanlar, rütbeler almaya çabalıyorlar. ‘Benim şuyum var, ben bu oldum,’ diye böbürleniyorlar... Bu mu yaşamak? Ben bunu istemem. Ne öğreneceğim orada, ne alacağım?”
― Ivan Goncharov, quote from Oblomov


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