• A gripping story of the scientific breakthrough crucial to modern medical care: explores the polio epidemic that led to the invention of intensive care and ventilators, which weren’t created until 1952. 

• Will appeal to readers of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, The Ghost Map, and other in-depth investigations into the epidemics and medical breakthroughs that have shaped our lives today. 

• Explores the reality of a “forgotten” disease: polio epidemics terrorized communities until the mid 1950s when vaccines were developed, causing more than 15,000 cases of paralysis in the U.S. each year, which older generations will remember. 
  
  
• Timely: The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored the importance of intensive care to our medical system—which was only made possible because of the doctors and scientists detailed in this book.
  
  
• Polio is back in the news: in 2022 the U.S. recorded its first polio case in decades in New York, prompting a new push for vaccines and awareness.