Anthrax: The Investigation of a Deadly Outbreak (Paperback)

~ (Author) "Tuesday, June 2, 1992. After a long transatlantic flight from New York,our research team arrives in the new post-Soviet Russia, a nation that six months..." (more)
Key Phrases: veterinary documents, anthrax aerosol, daytime locations, United States, Soviet Union, Professor Borisov (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The great equalizer between humans and sheep, anthrax has filled us with morbid curiosity as far back as records exist. Once believed to be a manifestation of unholy fire, today it is seen as a weapon of deranged terrorists or sinister governments. Medical anthropologist Jeanne Guillemin's Anthrax: The Investigation of a Deadly Outbreak examines the 1979 deaths of 64 Soviet citizens in the Ural mountains. Blamed at the time on tainted meat, Guillemin's team proved that a plume of spores from a nearby military site caused the event (Boris Yeltsin admitted this much at about the same time). Not just a medical detective story, Guillemin's book is also an insightful look into the effects such an outbreak has on survivors and a penetrating analysis of the prospects of biological warfare in the not-too-distant future. Starting in the local cemetery to find the victims' identities--the KGB had long ago seized their records--the team interviews survivors and kin, unleashing long-repressed feelings and yielding valuable information about those struck down. Ultimately, despite interference from the Russian military and civil service, the tainted meat hypothesis is refuted and clear evidence of illegal and dangerous research released. The reader is left to wonder about one Russian's suggestion that if the wind had changed course one day in 1979, hundreds of thousands might have died. Where does that leave us today? --Rob Lightner --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

In a dense and unsettling work, Boston College sociologist Guillemin depicts her 1992 journey to Russia to research a mysterious 1979 anthrax epidemic: little was known about the outbreak, in which 64 died in the remote province of Yekaterinburg, between Kazakhstan and Siberia. In pat and conflicting comments, Russian authorities said the outbreak had followed anthrax's usual pattern, deriving from either soil, ceramics dust or contaminated meat. But a general suspicion developed in the scientific and intelligence communities that the anthrax had resulted from a more unusual aerosol emission from the nearby Compound 19, a weapons facility. Was the outbreak a result of biological weapons technology? Guillemin's team members gather the evidence, though they are unable to establish a definitive answer. Her sociological background leads her to focus on the human variables in this scientific mystery; by tracking down survivors of the outbreak, she hoped to shed light on the enigmas of the disease's dispersal rate and pattern. Unfortunately, her recounting of many minute sparring sessions with the team's wily Russian counterparts, as well as a morass of sociological commentary on a fragmenting postcommunist Russian society, are prolix. Though it raises disturbing questions about research in biological warfare, this medical mystery is more appropriate for epidemiology and other medical professionals rather than fans of The Hot Zone.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 339 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press; 1 edition (February 5, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520229177
• ISBN-13: 978-0520229174
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #913,226 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating and informative., November 16, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Anthrax: The Investigation of a Deadly Outbreak (Hardcover)

Guillemin's fascinating story of the research conducted in Russia to find the truth behind the 1979 anthrax outbreak in Sverdlovsk, now Yaketerinburg says much about life under the old Soviet regime. Official silence on key information compunded with official statements never really believed by those hearing it lead to all sorts of wild rumors, many repeated by the US government which probably had little firm evidence to go on. (Given that many major disasters under the Soviet regime such as plane crashes, subway cave-ins and train wrecks were never publicly announced, US analysts might well have thought they were being reasonable in their reports of "thousands" dead in a release of anthrax spores.) The research steps taken by the Harvard University team, including the interviews conducted by Guillemin and her Russian assistants are laid out. The author recounts her reactions and those she interviews, showing the impact the outbreak had on the residents downwind of the mysterious Compound 19. She points how certain features of the Soviet regime assisted her : the lack of mobility for residents kept most survivors and relatives of the victims in the same neighborhoods, which made locating them for interviews much easier, and the centralized nature of the Soviet government enabled public health officials to quickly mobilize a response, saving some lives. "Anthrax" contains a rich bibliography for those with further interest in the history and use of biological weapons. The author restrains her obvious outrage at the existence and use of these weapons, hoping that publicizing their existence and potential threat will encourage the rest of us to take steps to contain and eventually eliminate them. To her credit, she does point out how public scares can exaggerate the usefulness of bio-weapons, and become excuses for continued restriction on the freedoms of the public. Recommended for those in public health and epidemiology, those concerned with the threat of biological weapons, and historians of the Former Soviet Union.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Recommended Reading by Nervegas.com, January 31, 2000

By	Reid Kirby (St. Charles, MO) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Anthrax: The Investigation of a Deadly Outbreak (Hardcover)

Jeanne Guillemin writes a first person account of an independent investigation of the 1979 Anthrax outbreak in Soviet Sverdlovsk. The style of writting is unique in that she intersperses throughout the book loosely related discussions of sociological and cultural literature. Anthrax comes to the conclusion that the outbreak was pulmonary anthrax emminating from Military Compound 19. The books one and only disappointment is the groups failure to investigate the military compound (they couldn't get on it)...leaving the reader with the body, the smoke, but no gun.

The author freely expresses her opinions throughout the book. She describes the personal losses from the anthrax fatalities. Her description of the casualty presentation is a must read...the mild onset followed by a sudden collapse after the anthrax eclipse. She points out several times the exagerations of risks and the BW terrorist threat.

The ending leaves one feeling uneasy with Russian officials now seeming to be less candid about the incident, and former ones pointing out the matter should be dropped due to the multi-lateral aspect of BW today.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Passe, October 19, 2003

By A Customer

I looked to this book for more details about the Sverdlovsk outbreak after reading Biohazard, the excellent expose by Ken Alibek published a year after this book. Comparisons of the two books are inherently unfair and at the same time unavoidable because Alibek, who spent two decades directing major parts of the Soviet Union's covert biological warfare programs, knows so much more than everyone involved with this investigation could have ever hoped to uncover. Bottom line: I strongly recommend "Biohazard" over this book. Alibek's chapter on Sverdlovsk has riveting first-hand accounts of the accident at the anthrax production facility. And he names names!

This book presents circumstantial evidence from people who were outside the biological warfare program: attending doctors, victims' families, etc. Like "Biohazard," it also refutes the official "contaminated meat" story.

I did get a bit of the additional detail I was looking for, and for that I give it two stars, but it meanders quite a bit with childish, off-topic editorial musings that belong in a travelogue rather than in a presentation of findings, and I found it dull. I have more criticisms of this book but see no use in presenting them: there are nearly 400 used copies for sale here as I type this. It's dead.