Author: Andy Forney

By Major Andy Forney

The other day, while at the gym, I had the unique experience of viewing CNN’s frontal assault-style coverage of Ebola in the United States. Talking heads, all looking very serious, discussed the prospects of the disease’s transfer among the general public, oftentimes framed with a odd red, white, and blue tinted microscopic image of the virus. The gym had thankfully muted the sound, but the baleful pictures and serious looks seemed to be pulled from a “how-the-zombie-apocalypse-started” montage from the latest horror movie. I wondered briefly if the Ebola patient in Dallas had somehow managed to be on the missing Malaysian plane from last summer. And, from my perspective, such coverage seemed to be working; I witnessed at least two customers at my local brick-and-mortar commercial bookstore holding copies of Richard Preston’s The Hot Zone in just thirty minutes.

            It is not that The Hot Zone is a bad book, or that the experts on CNN do not possess the background to discuss Ebola. Rather, both Preston’s book and cable’s news coverage do not allow those attempting to formulate a strategic response to the Ebola crisis at home, and more importantly in Africa, to think dispassionately about their subjects. The United States appears to be groping towards setting a precedent for using elements from the entire DIME spectrum to respond to pandemic threats. And for the first time, military force looks to become the primary factor in the U.S. response. Strategists, military and civilian alike, now face the daunting task of crafting a strategy that most effectively stops the viruses spread, and then sets the conditions to preclude or limit future pandemic-size outbreaks.

            In this light, what are the best books to read about epidemics, society, and strategy? Frankly, no one books answers these questions. The Hot Zone provides a page-turning read with a nice account of Ebola’s first outbreaks, its morphology, and dramatizes its future spread, but does not place the virus adequately within a joint/inter-agency response campaign. As I looked through my bookshelves, I gravitated to a handful of books that I think best illustrate two central themes we must consider as we look at disease in modern world history: first, how disease and epidemics can quickly destabilize societies and cultures and have real-world strategic impacts; and second, how quickly epidemics and their responses become politicized.