Tinderbox: How the West Sparked the AIDS Epidemic and How the World Can Finally Overcome It

I am a physician and epidemiologist who has watched the evolution of AIDS from the time of its first appearance in San Francisco. This book has been very helpful to me. It retraces the history of AIDS and the evolution of the perception of the disease in a gripping and (for me) convincing way.I have been struck by how often the initial contruct of a disease is distorted by the nature of index cases and/or by the limitations of early investigative methods. Tuberculosis, malaria, Legionaires' disease, peptic ulcer, etc. are good examples of this phenomenon. "Tinderbox" shows how AIDS belongs on this list.While I strongly recommend this very readable book, I must point out a two things that I wish were different about it. First is the ambivalence about whether Halperin is a co-author or a protagonist. This is addressed forthrightly in the Authors' Note that follows the title page, but it was still a bit unsettling to have Halpern referred to in the third person. My second quibble concerns at least two historical references that should have been researched more carefully: (i)the German hyperinflation occured in the early 1920's, not in the 1930's and (ii) the employees of the Broad Street Brewery were spared cholea because they mainly drank free beer instead of water and what water they did drink came from the brewery's own deep well, not because alcohol protects against cholora

This poignant and well-researched history of the AIDS epidemic and the international community's foibles (and successes) along the way is a must read for any public health professional or student.It's really too bad that the reviews here have been taken over by an ideological group that shuns science and hard fact. This group has mobilized hundreds of people to write bad reviews and then rate their friend's bad reviews as helpful.The reviews (by people who obviously haven't read the book) are really about their opposition to male circumcision, not about the content of the book at all. Which is pretty nonsensical, seeing as how the majority of legitimate public health institutions (including the World Health Organization and UNAIDS) have accepted that voluntary medical male circumcision prevents HIV by over 60%, and long term data shows it protects by 76%! That's better than even the flu vaccine- so it's surprising that these ideological quacks would rather let Africans die from a preventable disease than admit they don't understand science.Anyway, READ THE BOOK! There were always be quacks and naysayers out there (akin to those who still oppose the measles vaccine because they think it causes autism). The racist attacks on the author in these reviews do nothing to bolster their credibility!

A senior executive at the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative recommended this book as a primer on the fight (so far) to end HIV/AIDS. Discussions of policy and science are not often page turners. But TINDERBOX turned out to be just that. Written by Washington Post reporter, Craig Timberg, TINDERBOX shot down pretty much every assumption I held about the epidemic. Did you know, for instance, that the virus itself is probably tens of thousands of years old ... and was unleashed on humankind thanks to the depredations of fin de siècle colonialism? Me neither. Everything I thought I knew about the infection (as a white, heterosexual, reasonably well-informed male raised and educated in the US) turned out to be either years out of date or just plain wrong ... even embarrassingly stupid. If the truth about HIV/AIDS, a modern killer of unbelievable magnitude, is of interest to you, read this account.

The first part of the book is on the history of HIV/AIDS. This alone is worth the cost of the book. I am a physician that started practice before HIV and I remember the the fears, the false assumptions, the shunning of patients, and the years of human tragedy before retrovirals.The discussion of circumcision and HIV transmission is a subject that was known in the medical community for many years but popularly ignored by the media in favor of the anti-circumcision movement. It is refreshing to see a new look at the issue. No matter your personal beliefs on the subject, prospective parents of male infants should at least read the other side of the controversy before making a decision "to cut or not to cut."

Tinderbox offers a very important and extremely read-able investigative and solidly scientific narrative on the story of HIV/AIDS in Africa giving outstanding evidence especially in its treatment of male circumcision (MC) for HIV prevention. All told, speaking as an African researcher on HIV/AIDS in general and who has been studying MC for HIV prevention in particular for many years, I find this book to be extremely invaluable in educating even lay persons on the subject.Readers should overlook the one-liner denunciations of this book, and read the expose' of these opponents' distortions at the online journal Slate posted Monday September 24th with the heading "AMAZON WARFARE: How an anti-circumcision fringe group waged an ideological attack against AIDS scholarship"

So apparently AIDS didn't start because a man had sex with a monkey years ago. Who knew?All kidding aside, Timberg does a great job explaining the origins of HIV, discussing various approaches that were implemented to stop the spread of the disease, and how people and politics got in the way. The book gives a good analysis that undermines a lot of the conventional wisdom about HIV and is well worth the read.

For anyone who has studied the global aides epidemic, and the on going efforts to fight same, this book opened even my eyes as to the overlooked simplicities that could have (and still can!) save millions. Well written, well researched and gave me a new perspective. My research had not reached identical conclusions, let me open to even further possibilities. A very well done and accessible book.

Excellent quality. Good Price. Great book with good info about AIDS epidemic. Bought it for a course which I am taking in University