Medicine

Sugar: The World Corrupted: From Slavery to Obesity

Filed Under: Books Read

Sugar: The World Corrupted: From Slavery to Obesity

Sugar: The World Corrupted: From Slavery to Obesity by James Walvin
Published by Pegasus Books on April 3, 2018
Pages: 352
Format: hardback
Genres: European World History, Health, Medicine
See it @ Goodreads


Synopsis

How did a simple commodity, once the prized monopoly of kings and princes, become an essential ingredient in the lives of millions, before mutating yet again into the cause of a global health epidemic?

Prior to 1600, sugar was a costly luxury, the domain of the rich. But with the rise of the sugar colonies in the New World over the following century, sugar became cheap, ubiquitous and an everyday necessity. Less than fifty years ago, few people suggested that sugar posed a global health problem.  And yet today, sugar is regularly denounced as a dangerous addiction, on a par with tobacco. While sugar consumption remains higher than ever—in some countries as high as 100lbs per head per year—some advertisements even proudly proclaim that their product contains no sugar.

How did sugar grow from prize to pariah? Acclaimed historian James Walvin looks at the history of our collective sweet tooth, beginning with the sugar grown by enslaved people who had been uprooted and shipped vast distances to undertake the grueling labor on plantations.  The combination of sugar and slavery would transform the tastes of the Western world.

Masterfully insightful and probing, James Walvin reveals the relationship between society and sweetness over the past two centuries—and how it explains our conflicted relationship with sugar today.  

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup

Filed Under: Books Read

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou
Published by Alfred A. Knopf on May 21, 2018
Pages: 341
Format: ebook
Genres: High-Stakes Science, Medicine, Nonfiction
See it @ Goodreads


Synopsis

The full inside story of the breathtaking rise and shocking collapse of a multibillion-dollar startup, by the prize-winning journalist who first broke the story and pursued it to the end in the face of pressure and threats from the CEO and her lawyers.

In 2014, Theranos founder and CEO Elizabeth Holmes was widely seen as the female Steve Jobs: a brilliant Stanford dropout whose startup "unicorn" promised to revolutionize the medical industry with a machine that would make blood tests significantly faster and easier. Backed by investors such as Larry Ellison and Tim Draper, Theranos sold shares in a fundraising round that valued the company at $9 billion, putting Holmes's worth at an estimated $4.7 billion. There was just one problem: The technology didn't work.

For years, Holmes had been misleading investors, FDA officials, and her own employees. When Carreyrou, working at The Wall Street Journal, got a tip from a former Theranos employee and started asking questions, both Carreyrou and the Journal were threatened with lawsuits. Undaunted, the newspaper ran the first of dozens of Theranos articles in late 2015. By early 2017, the company's value was zero and Holmes faced potential legal action from the government and her investors. Here is the riveting story of the biggest corporate fraud since Enron, a disturbing cautionary tale set amid the bold promises and gold-rush frenzy of Silicon Valley.

Who would have thought that a blonde haired, blue eyed nineteen-year-old drop out from Stanford University could have fooled so many, for so long? That is precisely what Elizabeth Holmes did when she incorporated her company Real-Time Cures, later renamed Theranos. By the end of 2004, Elizabeth had raised more than 6 million dollars. Before it all over Theranos had over 800 employees and a paper valuation of $9 billion. 

What happened at Theranos is a reflection of what is most common in our society today. A willingness to believe in something that can not possibly be true, a desire to follow an individual without rational thought or cause. How could someone deceive so many people for so long? What motivated Holmes to persist in this delusion? Holmes endangered thousands of lives by processing blood test without suffice blood samples. She has misled investors, terrorized employees and generally lied at every opportunity. 

This week Theranos was dissolved, it no longer exists, Elizabeth Holmes is facing criminal charges that could cost her 20 years in prison.

 

The Secret Life of Fat: The Science Behind the Body’s Least Understood Organ and What It Means for You

Filed Under: Books Read

The Secret Life of Fat: The Science Behind the Body’s Least Understood Organ and What It Means for You

The Secret Life of Fat: The Science Behind the Body's Least Understood Organ and What It Means for You by Sylvia Tara
Published by W. W. Norton & Company on December 27th 2016
Pages: 288
See it @ Goodreads


Synopsis

Fat is an obsession, a dirty word, a subject of national handwringing—and, according to biochemist Sylvia Tara, the least-understood part of our body.
You may not love your fat, but your body certainly does. In fact, your body is actually endowed with many self-defense measures to hold on to fat. For example, fat can use stem cells to regenerate; increase our appetite if it feels threatened; and use bacteria, genetics, and viruses to expand itself. The secret to losing twenty pounds? You have to work with your fat, not against it. Tara explains how your fat influences your appetite and willpower, how it defends itself when attacked, and why it grows back so quickly. The Secret Life of Fat brings cutting-edge research together with historical perspectives to reveal fat’s true identity: an endocrine organ that, in the right amount, is critical to our health. Fat triggers puberty, enables our reproductive and immune systems, and even affects brain size.
Although we spend $60 billion annually fighting fat, our efforts are often misinformed and misdirected. Tara expertly illustrates the complex role that genetics, hormones, diet, exercise, and history play in our weight, and The Secret Life of Fat sets you on the path to beat the bulge once and for all.

In Sylvia Tara’s book the The Secret Life of Fat, she discusses what some researchers have discovered about fat, she does an excellent job of describing in layperson terms how fat interacts with the body. By the end of the book, I understood that fat was very complex and it was able to effect our lives in many ways because of how it affects are bodies.

What disappointed me about the book was the way it ended, as a diet book. The author tells how she lost the 30 pounds she gained about having her third child. I think I would have enjoyed the book more if she had stuck to the science side as she did an excellent job of explaining how fat affects our bodies. I still think the book is worth reading, and recommend it because you do learn about fat and I found that fascinating.