Diseases and Human Evolution

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Recent interest in new diseases, such as HIV/AIDS and Ebola, and the resurgence of older diseases like tuberculosis has fostered questions about the history of human infectious diseases. How did they evolve? Where did they originate? What natural factors have stalled the progression of diseases or made them possible? How does a microorganism become a pathogen? How have infectious diseases changed through time? What can we do to control their occurrence? Writing in a clear, lively style, Barnes offers general overviews of every variety of disease and their carriers, from insects and worms through rodent vectors to household pets and farm animals. She devotes whole chapters to major infectious diseases such as leprosy, syphilis, smallpox, mad cow disease, West Nile virus, and Lyme disease. ANTHROPOLOGY • MEDICINE University of New Mexico Press unmpress.com • 800-249-7737 cover images: blood cells ©Getty Images; DNA ©Corbis; Skeleton: Bernard Siegfried Albinus, Tabulae Sceleti et Musculorum Corporis Humani, 1747, Plate 2 cover design: Kathleen Sparkes 9 xHSKIMGy330666zv*:+:!:+:! isbn-13: 0-8263-3066-6 isbn-10: 0-8263-3066-5 “This fascinating book brings together information about emerging and reemerging infectious diseases and human cultural evolution. . . . The book is very readable. I recommend this book very highly, particularly for college and public libraries.” — Science Books & Films “Ethne Barnes provides a readable account of diseases past and future and of how human habits influence disease.” — JAMA: Journal of American Medical Association “[Diseases and Human Evolution] provides a fairly complete understanding of the subspecialty of medical anthropology which examines the interplay of human culture and the evolution of disease.” — Doody’s Medical Reviews Ethne Barnes was a paleopathologist at Wichita State University. She has done research in Greece, China, Mongolia, and the American Southwest and is the author of Developmental Defects of the Axial Skeleton in Paleopathology. She currently lives in Arizona. ...