Over the last decades, we have seen more than three dozen new infectious diseases appear, some of which could kill millions of people with one or two unlucky gene mutations or one or two unfavourable environmental changes. The risks of pandemics only increase as the human population grows; therefore to direct our future we should examine our past. Howard Phillips provides the first look into the history of epidemics in South Africa, probing lethal episodes which significantly shaped this society over three centuries.

Focusing on devastating diseases such as smallpox, bubonic plague, Spanish influenza, polio and HIV/Aids, Plague, Pox and Pandemics probes their origin, their catastrophic course and their consequences in both the short and long term. Their impact ranges from the demographic to the political, the social, the economic, the spiritual, the psychological and the cultural. As each of these epidemics occurred at crucial moments in the country's history - early in European colonisation, in the midst of the mineral revolution, during the South African War and World War I, as industrialisation was getting under way, and within the eras of apartheid and post-apartheid - the book also examines how these processes affected and were affected by the five epidemics, thereby adding important dimensions to an understanding of each.

To those who read this book, South African history will not look the same again.

Drawing on an extensive array of sources – written, oral and visual – this richly illustrated volume provides a rounded social, intellectual, educational, cultural and political history of one of Africa’s foremost universities during the first phase of apartheid.

It puts a spotlight on its leaders, lecturers and learners, but its wide focus takes in many other dimensions of this heterogeneous institution’s history too – teaching and research, social, cultural and sporting life and its chequered relationship with the apartheid state, ranging from formal opposition and protest and students’ growing defiance culminating in the sit-in of 1968, to ambivalence and willing collaboration. All of these it weaves together into a many-sided whole to produce an elegant, accessible and nuanced study of the operation of UCT as apartheid began to be imposed on South Africa.

Howard Phillips gives us a pioneering and definitive history of the period. And one which will occupy pride of place on the bookshelves of the academics and the thousands of alumni who helped shape this history and the many ordinary Capetonians touched by Varsity.

'The thing came abruptly and unannounced; a demon, rat-like, scurrying from pits remote and unimaginable, a hellish panting and stifled grunting, and then from that opening beneath the chimney a burst of multitudinous and leprous life - a loathsome night-spawned flood of organic corruption more devastatingly hideous than the blackest conjurations of mortal madness and morbidity.' Only the expansive imagination of H.P. Lovecraft could conceive the delicious and spine-tingling horrors you will find within the pages of this unique collection. In addition to such classics as The Picture in the House, The Music of Erich Zann and The Rats in the Walls, this volume contains some fascinating rarities: examples of Lovecraft's earliest weird fiction and material unpublished during his lifetime. H.P. Lovecraft's creation of the Cthulhu Mythos has influenced many modern authors, and still remains at the forefront of supernatural literature.

This is the first history of epidemics in South Africa, lethal episodes that significantly shaped this society over three centuries. Focusing on five devastating diseases between 1713 and today-smallpox, bubonic plague, \u201cSpanish influenza,\u201d polio, and HIV/AIDS-the book probes their origins, their catastrophic courses, and their consequences in both the short and long terms. The impacts of these epidemics ranged from the demographic-the \u201cSpanish flu,\u201d for instance, claimed the lives of 6 percent of the country's population in six weeks-to the political, the social, the economic, the spiritual, the psychological, and the cultural. Moreover, as each of these epidemics occurred at crucial moments in the country's history-such as during the South African War and World War I-the book also examines how these processes affected and were affected by the five epidemics. To those who read this book, history will not look the same again.

The Spanish Influenza pandemic of 1918-19 was the worst pandemic of modern times, claiming over 30 million lives in less than six months. In the hardest hit societies, everything else was put aside in a bid to cope with its ravages. It left millions orphaned and medical science desperate to find its cause. Despite the magnitude of its impact, few scholarly attempts have been made to examine this calamity in its many-sided complexity. On a global, multidisciplinary scale, the book seeks to apply the insights of a wide range of social and medical sciences to an investigation of the pandemic. Topics covered include the historiography of the pandemic, its virology, the enormous demographic impact, the medical and governmental responses it elicited, and its long-term effects, particularly the recent attempts to identify the precise causative virus from specimens taken from flu victims in 1918, or victims buried in the Arctic permafrost at that time.

The Spanish Influenza pandemic of 1918-19 was the worst pandemic of modern times, claiming over 30 million lives in less than six months. In the hardest hit societies, everything else was put aside in a bid to cope with its ravages. It left millions orphaned and medical science desperate to find its cause. Despite the magnitude of its impact, few scholarly attempts have been made to examine this calamity in its many-sided complexity.
On a global, multidisciplinary scale, the book seeks to apply the insights of a wide range of social and medical sciences to an investigation of the pandemic. Topics covered include the historiography of the pandemic, its virology, the enormous demographic impact, the medical and governmental responses it elicited, and its long-term effects, particularly the recent attempts to identify the precise causative virus from specimens taken from flu victims in 1918, or victims buried in the Arctic permafrost at that time.

Related link: The Society for the Social History of Medicine
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