Author:
Eliana Liotta
and Massimo Clementi
Publishing house:
Theseus’ ship
Date of publication:
25-06-2020
Extreme heat, hurricanes, torrential rains, wildfires, aggressive new viruses like the one that scarred the entire world in 2020. Nature began to rebel. And we are running out of time: man’s impact on our planet now carries an unsustainable burden. Many infectious diseases in recent decades, from Ebola to AIDS, from hendra to dengue, are not just tragedies dictated by chance. There is a deep connection between their spread and climate change, deforestation, pollution, and even social inequality, because poverty and hunger are allies of viruses. This book embraces for the first time in a single glance the infinitesimal vision of microscopes and the great breath of the Earth.
Narrating is science journalist and writer Eliana Liotta, who reflects with one of the most highly regarded medical virologists on the international scene, Massimo Clementi. Studies on the inseparable relationship between human health and the health of the planet become living matter of narrative, validated by the European Institute on Economics and the Environment (EIEE), the European institute engaged in economic and environmental research. With the clarity of parents who are good at answering their children’s questions or those professors who know how to explain to students, the authors make a rigorous point about the real causes of modern epidemics and possible cures, with an in-depth look at foods that support the immune system. We must learn from our mistakes and act now to correct them. The climate of a future that in some ways is already present can turn vast swaths of the earth into incredible incubators for mosquito larvae. Melting polar ice caps may threaten us with giant viruses re-emerging from glaciers. In degraded ecosystems, pathogens adapt to the few remaining wild species and are more easily able to make the leap from a bat or rodent to us. In polluted areas, microorganisms find paved highways to settle and multiply.
Nature asks us to make peace with her. Let’s listen to it.
Part of the proceeds from the sale of the book will be donated to scientific research at IRCSS San Raffaele Hospital in Milan.