The Bookshelf: Feb. 14, 2017

Trib+Health is joining with respected books authority Kirkus Reviews to bring you select reviews of books of note in the field of health care. For more book reviews and recommendations, visit Kirkus.com.

THE VACCINE RACE: Science, Politics and the Human Costs of Defeating Disease

A dramatic medical history that reveals the progress and the stumbles, the personalities and the rivalries, in the race to find a vaccine for rubella, or German measles… Wadman focuses on Leonard Hayflick and Stanley Plotkin, scientists at the Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, and cell line WI-38, derived from the lungs of a fetus legally aborted in Sweden (and used without the mother’s consent), which subsequently became key to developing a vaccine that has been given to hundreds of millions of people… An important story well told, featuring the drama and characters needed to make this a candidate for film adaptation.

For the full review, visit kirkus.com.