Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything by Lydia Kang (PDF)

Description

What won’t we try in our quest for perfect health, beauty, and the fountain of youth? Well, just imagine a time when doctors prescribed morphine for crying infants. When liquefied gold was touted as immortality in a glass. And when strychnine—yes, that strychnine, the one used in rat poison—was dosed like Viagra. Looking back with fascination, horror, and not a little dash of dark, knowing humor, Quackery recounts the lively, at times unbelievable, history of medical misfires and malpractices. Ranging from the merely weird to the outright dangerous, here are dozens of outlandish, morbidly hilarious “treatments”—conceived by doctors and scientists, by spiritualists and snake oil salesmen (yes, they literally tried to sell snake oil)—that were predicated on a range of cluelessness, trial and error, and straight-up scams. With vintage illustrations, photographs, and advertisements throughout, Quackery seamlessly combines macabre humor with science and storytelling to reveal an important and disturbing side of the ever-evolving field of medicine.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐I really enjoyed reading this book. It’s informative well researched and written. It’s mind blowing just how now a day medicine got its start from some shady roots.

⭐In all honesty I loved the book! I am currently studying kinesiology so the book peaked my interest. I had to power through the blood letting chapter because I made my skin crawl. It has a lot of interesting facts that can stir up a good conversation. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who is interested in this kind of stuff. 10 out of 10!

⭐This book was informative and interesting. The authors have a sense of humor that lend itself to the topic so the book isn’t dry. I found myself shaking my head over some of these “cures” and thankful I live in a time of modern science and medicine.

⭐Definitely a great way to pass a few hours! Especially if you enjoy shaking your head at the medical professionals of the past!

⭐Such an awesome book! I couldn’t put it down. Educational and hilarious. It really shows how far we’ve come in medicine and the crazy things people have done in the pursuit of health and healing. I’ve been telling everyone about it and recommend to anyone who loves strange medical history.

⭐I absolutely love this book. I’ve never read anything like it before and it led me on a deep dive in each case and quack. Fascinating!

⭐I really enjoyed reading this book. It took you through a large history of quack cures. It was Interesting, funny, and I learned what some references in books I read mean. Like why are you bringing laughing gas on a trip? I guess that was a fun recreational thing at one point? I also liked how some of these cures carried on into our modern world. One being leaches used to help restore blood flow in delicate reconstruction areas like the tongue.Some things were just gross but interesting. Like the forever poop pills and vomit cups. Who would have thought that was a great idea?The book was just entertaining and made me think of one of my teachers I had in college. Kind of

⭐“Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything” by Lydia Kang is wickedly funny in an at-times gruesome sort of way. I initially discovered this author via her novel “Opium and Absinthe” (reviewed for Amazon on 3/7/2021) and her “Afterword” in that book so fascinated me that I decided to purchase this one. Although Kang pokes a lot of holes in the absurdly unscientific (and often viciously dangerous) “cures” of times past – and sometimes even present – she also focuses attention on the way in which genuine helpful therapies may result from “folk medicine”. This book is a lively read with a lot of genuine depth and insight. It is worth keeping on hand, not only as a precaution against being “taken in” by outrageous patent-medicine claims, but also as a guide to the basic premise that if the cure is worse than the disease, it needs to be avoided.

⭐One of the best books I’ve read in a long while. Informative, full of interesting and surprising facts told with such humour that I was crying with laughter at certain points (even if the subject matter was in reality quite horrifying). It’s amazing how human nature is still the same no matter what era we live in. The book is written in an easy to read, well structured manner and made me want to swipe each page asap. Couldn’t put it down and I was hungry for more when I’d finished. Please write more. You make a fantastic team!

⭐Bought as a gift. Recipient very pleased with the book.

⭐Very good book and a lot of strange but true facts however I didn’t like the Middle Ages killed kitten cure for cancer

⭐Good read,short descriptions just now I like books

⭐Really interesting book! Enjoyed reading it very much.

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