The Miraculous Fever-Tree: Malaria, Medicine and the Cure that Changed the World Paperback – May 18, 2004

Well-written and very interesting. I didn't know that malaria was such a problem in Europe, especially around Rome. It was even a big problem in England, which I never thought of as a malarial area. I can recommend this book very highly.I thought the Kindle edition was well-done. I haven't seen the "real" book, and the Kindle book was listed as "text only" so I'm not sure if there are maps and photos or illustrations in the hardback. That did delay my purchase of the Kindle edition. I had no navigational problems with it and the text was pretty much typo-free.

Arrived in time. Interesting book, descriptive and clear, mixes personal and family remembers and details with the scientific history of malaria.

Frightening

This covers the history and uses of the Chinchona tree of the Peruvian Andes, which was observed by a Jesuit to be used by native peoples when they were shivering. He suggested it could be useful in helping people in Europe who had agues and fevers, which caused shivering. The resulting bark medicine became a cure for malaria and a spur to science.The start of the book is rather jumbled with various locations and times mixed in one chapter. The author's family mingles with ancient history. After that the book settles into a timeline, which explores a period and skips decades or centuries to the next chapter.We don't hear much now about malaria in Europe. Yet much of Italy, even parts of Rome near the Tiber, were plagued by malarial mosquitoes making the place unfit for habitation during the warm months. We learn of a Vatican Conclave to choose a Pope, during which the bishops hoped to be decided as quickly as possible because they couldn't leave and were likely to get malaria. France too had malaria, as did the Low Countries (of course, all that reclaimed river delta) and the marshier parts of England. The mosquitoes now found in the New World are considered to have been brought there, one by European explorers, the other and more deadly by African slave ships.Wars and medics, colonists and traders, all needed cures for malaria. The Jesuit bark or Peruvian bark from a variety of subspecies worked so well that a giant industry sprang up to exploit it, which overrode the original teaching of the Jesuits that for every tree felled five should be planted. So many tonnes of quinine were shipped worldwide that the trees were becoming scarce. Enter the plant hunters of Kew and the Chelsea Physic Gardens, who made sure to obtain seeds, smuggling them out of the continent and to India or Java for a diversity of production and to save the species from extinction. Quinine was needed while building the Panama Canal or settling in Africa. And then, of course, in WW2 the Germans and Japanese between them managed to seize almost all the world's quinine.We also get the studies of malarial mosquitoes under the new microscopes to understand how the disease was transmitted, the discoverer of the life cycle of the plasmodium parasite being awarded a Nobel prize.The author has examined records which she says had never seen the light of day since being written and stored, has travelled and hunted for correspondence from the wide variety of people - almost all men, apart from a fable about a Countess - involved from medieval Italy to modern Congo. Whether your interest is plants, history, warfare, medicine, cultural anthropology, or science, you will find entertainment and enlightenment in The Miraculous Fever Tree.Notes and index P315 - 348. I counted 14 names which I could be sure were female.I borrowed this book from the Royal Dublin Society Library. This is an unbiased review.

Currently in Madagascar in the malaria season, I picked this up with interest, but little did I anticipate just how fascinating this book is. The first two chapters are a bit repetitive, but once you're through the Jesuit involvement it's gripping. I stayed up in candle light during a power cut (one of many) to get to the end. Highly recommended to anyone with a passing interest in malaria. Enjoy!!

A wonderful history of malaria and quinine that not only explains how and why quinine was found but also how it works and how it's use has affected mankind, history and even the development of medicine itself. Yet, in all this, it reads like a fast paced detective story. Worth a few evenings spent with it.

The story of quinine is fascinating and it's told rather well here. How malaria has shaped human history for a thousand years. Great read.

A fascinating book of history, religion, ecomonics and the effects of this terrible disease and how it is cured. Brilliant!

I found this book to be only mildly interesting. At times out was difficult to follow the timeline. (It jumped around a bit).I also felt at times that the book was poorly written.It was clear that the author has done an awful lot of research,that is admirable, however I think she should have been more critical in deciding which aspects to include in thebook.