The Making of Modern Medicine: Turning Points in the Treatment of Disease
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by Michael Bliss
It’s hard to imagine a time when Labatt’s beer was marketed as a cure for smallpox, or when the best treatment available for diabetes was starvation. Yet, as Michael Bliss reminds us in his latest book, that time was not all that long ago.
In The Making of Modern Medicine, Bliss identifies three key turning points in medical history — Montreal’s 1885 smallpox epidemic, the rise of John Hopkins Hospital and University, and the discovery of insulin — and he masterfully illuminates the broader trends and changes in the field that got us to where we are today.
The book is barely one hundred pages long, and Bliss’s engaging style makes it an easy single-sitting read. Readers will inevitably pause, however, during Bliss’s provocative epilogue, where he considers the “ironies and contradictions” of modern health care and leads one to question the whole notion of progress.
Bliss’s work will be equally appealing to those with an introductory or an advanced knowledge of Canadian medical history. Even the queasiest of us will have no problem reading this compelling and thought-provoking book.
— Joanna Dawson (Read bio)
Joanna Dawson is Canada's History Society's Acting Director of Programs.