Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

  • Deadly Outbreaks

  • How Medical Detectives Save Lives Threatened by Killer Pandemics, Exotic Viruses, and Drug-Resistant Parasites
  • By: Alexandra Levitt
  • Narrated by: Julie McKay
  • Length: 9 hrs and 28 mins
  • 4.2 out of 5 stars (84 ratings)
Offer ends May 1st, 2024 11:59PM GMT. Terms and conditions apply.
£7.99/month after 3 months. Renews automatically.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Deadly Outbreaks cover art

Deadly Outbreaks

By: Alexandra Levitt
Narrated by: Julie McKay
Get this deal Try for £0.00

Pay £99p/month. After 3 months pay £7.99/month. Renews automatically. See terms for eligibility.

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically.

Buy Now for £14.99

Buy Now for £14.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Listeners also enjoyed...

Pandemics cover art
The Deadly Air cover art
Toms River cover art
What the F cover art
The Doctor Will See You Now cover art
Immune cover art
Quicksilver cover art
Sophie's World cover art
The Next Pandemic cover art
Space Chronicles cover art
Cancerland cover art
The Making of a Chef cover art
Asleep cover art
Alan Turing: The Enigma cover art
Dr. Mutter's Marvels cover art
Nine Pints cover art

Editor reviews

Alexandra Levitt is an expert in emergent diseases and public health issues. In this audiobook, she relays information and stories on the complex and fascinating subject of infectious microbes. Julie McKay narrates with a deliberate, clear voice, which will help listeners grasp the intricacies of the subject. The chapters are organized by microbial strains, and each chapter gives background on the known facts of the particular microbe, as well public policy and history related to it. While the subject of the audio is scientific, Levitt pries into all related areas: homicide, deadly outbreaks, and the successes and failures of those people working to stop these invisible, deadly killers. Listeners will be shocked and terrified by what they will learn - but ultimately grateful to be more informed.

Summary

Take a visit to the frontline as scientists fight to solve medical mysteries.

Despite advances in health care, infectious microbes continue to be a formidable adversary to scientists and doctors. Vaccines and antibiotics, the mainstays of modern medicine, have not been able to conquer infectious microbes because of their amazing ability to adapt, evolve, and spread to new places. Terrorism aside, one of the greatest dangers from infectious disease we face today is from a massive outbreak of drug-resistant microbes.

Deadly Outbreaks recounts the scientific adventures of a special group of intrepid individuals who investigate these outbreaks around the world and figure out how to stop them. Part homicide detective, part physician, these medical investigators must view the problem from every angle, exhausting every possible source of contamination. Any data gathered in the field must be stripped of human sorrows and carefully analyzed into hard statistics.

Author Dr. Alexandra Levitt is an expert on emerging diseases and other public health threats. Here she shares insider accounts she's collected that go behind the alarming headlines we've seen in the media: mysterious food poisonings, unexplained deaths at a children's hospital, a strange neurologic disease afflicting slaughterhouse workers, flocks of birds dropping dead out of the sky, and drug-resistant malaria running rampant in a refugee camp. Meet the resourceful investigators - doctors, veterinarians, and research scientists - and discover the truth behind these cases and more.

©2013 Alexandra Levitt (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

More from the same

What listeners say about Deadly Outbreaks

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    41
  • 4 Stars
    25
  • 3 Stars
    14
  • 2 Stars
    3
  • 1 Stars
    1
Performance
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    30
  • 4 Stars
    21
  • 3 Stars
    17
  • 2 Stars
    5
  • 1 Stars
    2
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    38
  • 4 Stars
    21
  • 3 Stars
    10
  • 2 Stars
    5
  • 1 Stars
    2

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Facinating Bugs

This is a fantastic book, it tells you about all those times people really needed TPTB to know what's wrong and how to put it right to save the rest of us from getting any nasty, fatal, diseases.
I've been fascinated by medical science since I was a child and have read books similar to this one before and I got to say this was well worth the listen. It goes into all the details of how diseases emerge, how they are spread, and how they are either eventually cured of not, which can be a very exciting tale.
I would whole heartedly recommend this book.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars
  • JM
  • 03-02-22

Disappointed

Deadly in that people died. Not so sure the outbreaks described is worse than many other outbreaks or that all 'stories' can be called outbreaks. For example, the second 'outbreak' reads more like a description of US immigration policy of the time!
I feel the narrator is not the right person for this type of book. She managed to make what could have been an interesting book quite mediocre.
Not all her fault though. I feel the author has dragged the description of the investigative process out unnecessarily. It made a boring read.
I struggled through to the end by skipping through the remaining chapters quite ruthlessly.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Real detective stories

Perfectly told. Unlike most of the literature, these stories do not start with the solution. They start with the first cases, initiating investigation, include wild goose chases, and finally some lessons learned. The book I alway wanted to read.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Z
  • 24-09-23

Informative and interesting.

A fascinating insight into a little thought of role which has devastatingly become a point of national fascination.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Extremely interesting and thought provoking

Fantastic book but seriously let down by the narrator, who made basic errors of mispronunciation and misreading.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

how to make good tale boring?

Struggled to finish it. Interesting needles in haystack of boredom! Good to put you to sleep though

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Hard to listen to

Much of the information is not relevant to the listener, especially the endless amount of acronyms. The story is interresting, but for me not living in USA, the acronyms makes it hard to listen to, as i don’t use these in my language and therefore just get an endless amount og letters I have no relation to. Why does it have to say NYC and not New York City? It takes exactly the same amount of time…

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Interesting stories, dull delivery

The medical mysteries were interesting but the author gave unnecessary complicated detail only relevant to fellow researchers ( and I am a biologist by training). Narration was clear but jarring and stilted. The whole thing could have been summarised in half the time and far more engagingly.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

appalling pronunciation

can't say to strongly how appealing her pronunciation is she should have been given a bit of help.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Fascinating

The story behind outbreaks of disease that we never get to hear. How spotting an outbreak is the first challenge, then convincing others is the second. Whatever it is you don't want to be the first person to show up with it, or even the 10th.
Bravo to these 'behind the scenes' people who are trying to keep pace with infectious illnesses across the world.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!