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The Demon in the Freezer: A True Story - Richard Preston
The Demon in the Freezer: A True Story
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3.69 40
“The bard of biological weapons capturesthe drama of the front lines.”-Richard Danzig, former secretary of the navyThe first major bioterror event in the United States-the anthrax attacks in October 2001-was a clarion call for scientists who work with “hot” agents to find ways of protecting... show more
“The bard of biological weapons capturesthe drama of the front lines.”-Richard Danzig, former secretary of the navyThe first major bioterror event in the United States-the anthrax attacks in October 2001-was a clarion call for scientists who work with “hot” agents to find ways of protecting civilian populations against biological weapons. In The Demon in the Freezer, his first nonfiction book since The Hot Zone, a #1 New York Times bestseller, Richard Preston takes us into the heart of Usamriid, the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick, Maryland, once the headquarters of the U.S. biological weapons program and now the epicenter of national biodefense.Peter Jahrling, the top scientist at Usamriid, a wry virologist who cut his teeth on Ebola, one of the world’s most lethal emerging viruses, has ORCON security clearance that gives him access to top secret information on bioweapons. His most urgent priority is to develop a drug that will take on smallpox-and win. Eradicated from the planet in 1979 in one of the great triumphs of modern science, the smallpox virus now resides, officially, in only two high-security freezers-at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta and in Siberia, at a Russian virology institute called Vector. But the demon in the freezer has been set loose. It is almost certain that illegal stocks are in the possession of hostile states, including Iraq and North Korea. Jahrling is haunted by the thought that biologists in secret labs are using genetic engineering to create a new superpox virus, a smallpox resistant to all vaccines.Usamriid went into a state of Delta Alert on September 11 and activated its emergency response teams when the first anthrax letters were opened in New York and Washington, D.C. Preston reports, in unprecedented detail, on the government’s response to the attacks and takes us into the ongoing FBI investigation. His story is based on interviews with top-level FBI agents and with Dr. Steven Hatfill.Jahrling is leading a team of scientists doing controversial experiments with live smallpox virus at CDC. Preston takes us into the lab where Jahrling is reawakening smallpox and explains, with cool and devastating precision, what may be at stake if his last bold experiment fails.From the Hardcover edition.
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Format: paperback
ISBN: 9780345466631 (0345466632)
Publisher: Fawcett
Pages no: 304
Edition language: English
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Community Reviews
Dispatches from Terabithia
Dispatches from Terabithia rated it
4.0 The Demon in the Freezer
2002 non-fiction about biological weapon agents smallpox and anthrax, and the American governmental defensive measures toward them. The book is mostly an account of the Smallpox Eradication Program, a discussion about smallpox’s status as a potential bioterrorism agent, and the controversy about th...
silverneurotic
silverneurotic rated it
4.0 The Demon in the Freezer
From Goodreads: “The bard of biological weapons capturesthe drama of the front lines.”-Richard Danzig, former secretary of the navyThe first major bioterror event in the United States-the anthrax attacks in October 2001-was a clarion call for scientists who work with “hot” agents to find ways of pro...
Lisa (Harmony)
Lisa (Harmony) rated it
3.0 The Demon in the Freezer: The Terrifying Truth About the Threat from Bioterrorism
I remember Preston's previous book, The Hot Zone about Ebola, absolutely blowing me away. A non-fiction book that was more terrifying than any thriller by Michael Crichton. This didn't impress me the way that other book did, even if it did suck me in and engross me--it read incredibly fast, the kind...
Bettie's Books
Bettie's Books rated it
0.0
nuutopening: n the early nineteen seventies, a British photo retoucher named Robert Stevens arrived in southFlorida to take a job at the National Enquirer, which is published in Palm Beach County. At the time,photo retouchers for supermarket tabloids used an airbrush (nowadays they use computers) to...
Melody Murray's Books
Melody Murray's Books rated it
3.0 The Demon in the Freezer: A True Story
This, the story of smallpox in modern times (with a little anthrax for spice), is tautly written, like a thriller. Which it sort of is, only scarier because it's true. Preston is a good writer, he picks out memorable things about people, and he gets a free pass from me forever after referring to a d...
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