In this concise and lucid book, global health activist Gates reflects on the current COVID-19 pandemic, considers future ones, and renders several sensible recommendations for prevention ... Passionate but never preachy, Gates delivers an expert, well-reasoned, and robust appeal for the world to unite in averting upcoming pandemics.
Every expert’s door opens to Gates and he is a fiendish researcher. Both are formidably informative reads. But Climate was better. How to Prevent a Pandemic runs out of steam towards the end and becomes a general statement of techno-optimism ... The problem, though, is that humanity’s woes are largely of humanity’s making; even the inhuman virus spread because of globalisation, world travel and the perversity of politics. Getting everybody to agree to Gates’s plans would be as improbable as President Macron persuading Putin to leave Ukraine. War is just another thing people do. Gates may be fighting losing battles on climate and pandemics, but those are, under the circumstances, the noblest kind.
... insightful ... Gates’s book is not a narrative of COVID; instead, its aims exclusively to propose global strategies for dealing with future pandemics. Utilizing his prodigious ability to analyze and synthesize data, Gates lays out a comprehensive, idealized plan to try and prepare every level of society to deal with widespread illness ... This book is a possible future blueprint for pandemic preparedness, which means that it’s best audiences might be governments and NGOs, rather than individuals.
Whether anything like germ will ever come to pass, as the world’s attention shifts from the crisis of covid-19 to the catastrophe in Ukraine, remains to be seen. But if this book stimulates even a little limit-pushing of the sort Mr Gates suggests, it will have served its purpose well.
... preventing pandemics is as much an epistemological problem as a technical one. We can prepare for known pandemic threats, but so-called Black Swan events are by definition unknowable and unpredictable...If this problem has occurred to Gates, he does a good job of disguising it ... Nor is he interested in addressing the role of information technology in spreading conspiracy theories about vaccines or misinformation about the effectiveness of lockdowns and mask mandates. This is surprising given that Gates has been accused of using vaccines to plant microchips in unsuspecting populations and is a prominent target for anti-vaxxers. But rather than calling for a rapid reaction team to neutralise fake news about vaccines, Gates ducks the issue, writing that he is confident 'the truth will outlive the lies' ... I do not share his optimism. If anything, the experience of Covid demonstrates that conspiracy theories now present a major impediment to the management of pandemics along rational scientific lines. Never mind Germ. What is needed is Dirt – Disinformation Response Team.
... thoughtful ... accessible prose ... Gates is realistic about what he’s up against, but he does a good job of making GERM’s $1 billion price tag seem reasonable, framing it as 'less than one-one-thousandth of the world’s annual spending on defense.' The result is an intriguing proposal to blunt future pandemics.
