Contagion- September 21,2013

 

Contagion 

Robin Cook

 434 pages

Jack Stapleton and Laurie Montgomery Series

Overview:
Direct from Robin Cook's website (http://robincook.com/book-display.php?isbn13=9780425155943)

From the undisputed master of the medical thriller comes the story of a deadly epidemic spread not merely by microbes but by sinister sabotage—a terrifying cautionary tale for the millennium as the health care giants collide.
After he loses first his Midwestern ophthalmology practice to a for-profit medical giant and then his family to a commuter airline tragedy, Dr. John Stapleton's life is transformed to ashes. Feeling less the golden boy than a jaded cynic, Stapleton retrains in forensic pathology and relocates to find an uneasy niche for himself in a city that suits his changed perspective: the cold, indifferent, concrete maze of New York.
Stapleton thinks he is past pain and past caring, but as a series of virulent and extremely lethal illnesses—capped by a particularly deadly outbreak of a rare strain of influenza—strikes the young, the old, and the innocent, his suspicions are aroused. When the apparent epicenters of these outbreaks are revealed to be hospitals and clinics controlled by the same for-profit giant that cannibalized his old ophthalmology practice, Stapleton fears he has stumbled upon a diabolic conspiracy of catastrophic proportions: Could the for-profit giant be engaged in the systematic elimination of its more costly subscribers?
Getting at the truth leads to Stapleton's unlikely pairing—both professionally and personally—with Terese Hagen, an art director at a hot Madison Avenue advertising firm. Together they discover that the real explanation behind the killer contagions is even more Machiavellian than could be imagined.
Contagion anticipates some of the uncharted consequences of managed health care, in an age when even the wariest consumer may be at risk. It is Robin Cook at his unerring best.

My Opinion:

Have you ever seen the movie Contagion? Well did you know there is a book which is the movie is probably  based on.I like a little syfy scientific scare to read, though watching it on screen is much harder and scarier.This book is really hard to explain without giving out spoilers,but I here I try.

 I really liked this book. I never knew the scares of a hospital before reading this book. Learning about different bacterial infections and the simple ways one deliberate mistake in a hospital can be the end of many lives is very interesting. So you must just go out and read it. This is for the mystery loving scientists out there.

P.S. Robin Cook is a great author and if you like this book check out the other books in the series. I suggest reading Vector (that's very good  book also- I read it two years ago, sadly out of order though).