East Baton Rouge Parish Library

A slight epidemic, the government cover-up of black plague in Los Angeles : what happened and why it matters, Frank Feldinger

eng

Includes bibliographical references (pages 189-204) and index

no index present

non fiction

A slight epidemic

191727582

Frank Feldinger

the government cover-up of black plague in Los Angeles : what happened and why it matters

"This first book by journalist and television producer Feldinger describes an epidemic of bubonic plague that swept through the Macy Street district, a poor, Hispanic neighborhood of Los Angeles, during the fall and winter of 1924-25. Though plague is now mercifully rare, in the 1920s, the overcrowded Macy Street neighborhood-with its substandard housing, numerous packing houses, and polluted Los Angeles River-provided an ideal environment for plague transmission. When what began as bubonic plague, spread by flea bites, emerged as pneumonic plague, transmittable directly from person to person, the outbreak became extremely serious and eventually resulted in some 37 fatalitiesPublic health and city officials initially misdiagnosed those affected, then denied the outbreak, and only later imposed a draconian quarantine. The Hispanic patients were deprived of the most effective remedy then known, though ample supplies were available, and as news of the plague leaked out, Hispanic workers experienced mass firings, evictions, and violence. Although Feldinger often writes like a blogger with a cause, the tragic story he tells, of the last black plague epidemic in the United States, will appeal to general readers interested in Hispanic or public health history.-Kathy Arsenault, Univ. of South Florida at St. Petersburg Lib