Big oil in the dock, the influenza trail, and insects as icons: Books in brief

Abstract

The Invisible Killer Gary Fuller Melville House (2018) More than 90% of humanity is exposed to air-pollution concentrations exceeding World Health Organization guidelines. For this compelling exploration of an insidious crisis, air-quality researcher Gary Fuller travelled deep into our fume-ridden past. Here are seventeenth-century arborist John Evelyn’s observations of coal-burning in London; John Switzer Owens’s 1910s particulate gauges; longitudinal mortality research such as the 1993 US Six Cities study; impact analyses of lead fuels, diesel, biomass burning and land use; and a look at our current policy battle to breathe easy.