FATAL PARTNERS

War and disease -- Hans Zinsser wrote a classic on the subject in Rats, Lice and History. This is a more thorough going job, historical and factual in method, lacking the sparkle, the originality, the drama of the Zinsser book, but covering more ground. A book for public health groups, for reference, rather than for general public consumption. But will tap the Zinsser market to some extent. The time spanned extends from classical times with the plague of Athens to the Polish invasion, showing how war presents new methods of destruction on one hand, and new methods for protection and treatment on the other. How, for centuries, disease killed more soldiers than battle; more civilians in wartime, than soldiers. The men of science and the parts they played in combating epidemics bred of war; the discoveries of causes and preventatives; sanitation and new methods of treating wounds. An important subject, of timely value, in the field of public health.