The Vaccine Race

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"Until the late 1960s, tens of thousands of American babies were born with crippling birth defects because their mothers were infected with rubella, popularly known as German measles, during pregnancy. But in 1962, a young biologist in Philadelphia, using tissue from an aborted fetus, produced safe, clean cells that allowed his colleague to create a vaccine. The rubella vaccine and others made with those fetal cells have protected more than 150 million people in the United States and untold millions globally. In 2015, the vaccine wiped out rubella in the Western Hemisphere. Meredith Wadman's masterful account recovers not only the science of the urgent race for a rubella vaccine, but also the David-and-Golath contest, strewn with political roadblocks, that the vaccine's inventor faced as he challenged deep-pocketed drug companies and obdurate regulators. And it describes the profoundly human story of thsoe who suffered at the hands of the disease. With Zika virus imperiling pregnant women and scientists warning of other frightening viruses with epidemic potential, no medical story could have more drama, impact, or urgency today than The Vaccine Race"--Back cover