A History of the World in Six Plagues: How Contagion, Class, and Captivity Shaped Us, from Cholera to Covid-19

With clear-eyed research and lush prose, A History of the World in Six Plagues is "a breathtaking journey through the intertwined histories of contagions and systemic inequities that have shaped our history" (Uch Blackstock, New York Times bestselling author).

Princeton-trained historian Edna Bonhomme's examination of humanity's disastrous treatment of pandemic disease takes us across place and time from Port-au-Prince to Tanzania, and from plantation-era America to our modern COVID-19-scarred world to unravel shocking truths about the patterns of discrimination in the face of disease. Also a rising call to action, this "tour de force...will change the way people think about public health and histories of medicine" (Dr. Tiffany N. Florvil, author of Mobilizing Black Germany).