Description:

She was an Irish immigrant cook. Between 1900 and 1907, she infected twenty-two New Yorkers with typhoid fever through her puddings and cakes; one of them died. Tracked down through epidemiological detective work, she was finally apprehended as she hid behind a barricade of trashcans. To protect the public's health, authorities isolated her on Manhattan's North Brother Island, where she died some thirty years later.

This book tells the remarkable story of Mary Mallon--the real Typhoid Mary. Combining social history with biography, historian Judith Leavitt re-creates early-twentieth-century New York City, a world of strict class divisions and prejudice against immigrants and women. Leavitt engages the reader with the excitement of the early days of microbiology and brings to life the conflicting perspectives of journalists, public health officials, the law, and Mary Mallon herself.

Leavitt's readable account illuminates dilemmas that continue to haunt us. To what degree are we willing to sacrifice individual liberty to protect the public's health? How far should we go in the age of AIDS, drug-resistant tuberculosis, and other diseases? For anyone who is concerned about the threats and quandaries posed by new epidemics, Typhoid Mary is a vivid reminder of the human side of disease and disease control.

From Publishers Weekly

Mary Mallon was a feisty 36-year-old Irish immigrant who made her living as a cook for wealthy New York City families when she was seized, in 1907, by officers of the city's Public Health Department and detained in a cottage on North Brother Island where, except for two years, she lived in isolation for the remaining 26 years of her life. Her crime was that, although healthy herself, she was a carrier of the typhus bacillus and had innocently infected 22 people. Leavitt raises questions about this famous case: whether race, gender and class bias played a part in Mallon's detention. At the time, feelings against the Irish were strong; and she was a woman and a servant. Male carriers of the bacillus were not deprived of their livelihoods, nor were they isolated from society. The press, clamoring for a news-making story, influenced the harsh treatment of Mallon, demonizing her as "Typhoid Mary." Most important, Leavitt, a professor of medical history at the University of Wisconsin, discusses the difficult issue of serving the public good while protecting individual liberty. She suggests that instead of stigmatizing or impoverishing those who unknowingly threaten the health of the community, we treat them humanely and guarantee them economic security. Resurrecting forgotten history, Leavitt raises an alarm that is much needed in this day of AIDS.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

The story of Mary Mallon, the Irish immigrant cook who later became known as "Typhoid Mary," dramatically illustrates the conflict between the needs of an individual and the needs of society. After she infected 22 people with typhoid, the public health authorities forcibly isolated Mallon for most of her adult life in an attempt to limit the spread of the disease. Leavitt (history of medicine, Univ. of Wiscon, Madison) has examined the medical, legal, and social perspectives of the early 20th century as she endeavors to understand Mallon's situation, her reactions to her isolation, and the reaction of the media and of the public. Leavitt concludes her book with an interesting discussion of the relevance of Mallon's story to recent public health concerns. Her discussion of the identification and labeling of people is particularly enlightening with regard to the current HIV dilemma. Leavitt does an admirable job of demonstrating the "delicate balance between personal liberty and public health." Recommended for any health science collection.?Tina Neville, Univ. of South Florida at St. Petersburg Lib.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.