Osterholm Michael T.

Every new development--from exploding human and animal populations to trade and travel--intensifies our susceptibility to a devastating epidemic. Ironically, a pandemic on the scale of the 1918 flu that killed perhaps a hundred million people would be deadlier today, despite a century of medical advances. As the current Zika epidemic proves, we are wholly unprepared for these diseases. So what can-and must--we do to protect ourselves against mankind's Deadliest Enemy? Separating experience-borne fact from mindless fear, Michael Osterholm and Mark Olshaker detail the plans and resources that must be in place when the unthinkable becomes the inevitable. DEADLIEST ENEMY is high scientific drama, a chronicle of mystery and discovery, a reality check, and a plan of action.

America is one killer organism away from a living nightmare that threatens all we hold dear....A deadly cloud of powdered anthrax spores settles unnoticed over a crowded football stadium.... A school cafeteria lunch is infected with a drug-resistant strain of E. coli.... Thousands in a bustling shopping mall inhale a lethal mist of smallpox, turning each individual into a highly infectious agent of suffering and death.... Dr. Michael Osterholm knows all too well the horrifying scenarios he describes. In this eye-opening account, the nation's leading expert on bioterrorism sounds a wake-up call to the terrifying threat of biological attack -- and America's startling lack of preparedness. He demonstrates the havoc these silent killers can wreak, exposes the startling ease with which they can be deployed, and asks probing questions about America's ability to respond to such attacks. Are most doctors and emergency rooms able to diagnose correctly and treat anthrax, smallpox, and other potential tools in the bioterrorist's arsenal? Is the government developing the appropriate vaccines and treatments? The answers are here in riveting detail -- what America has and hasn't done to prevent the coming bioterrorist catastrophe. Impeccably researched, grippingly told, Living Terrors presents the unsettling truth about the magnitude of the threat. And more important, it presents the ultimate insider's prescription for change: what we must do as a nation to secure our freedom, our future, our lives.