Book review: Microbial battlefields of life and death

Microbes make life on earth possible, but they can also kill people, certainly if they are of the "MRSA-type" (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus), a bacteria resistant to many antibiotics.That is why they also go under the name of "multi-drug resistant organisms" (MDROs).On their website, the Centre for Disease Control (CDC) in the USA estimates that there are some 70,000 severe infections with MRSA annually and 9,000 deaths.Until Antoni van Leeuwenhoek (1632-1723) designed the first microscopes in the 17th century, nobody could see microbes, as Anderson notes (47)(48).In this experimental autobiography of a disease, this historical detail is shared with the reader through the eyes of the erstwhile invisible microbes themselves: "We [the microbes] were everywhere, in everything, populating the living and unliving stuff of the world, beings that had infiltrated all but the coldest and hottest of Earth's materials" (48) [1].These microbial perspectives are presented as "interludes" in italics, in between the six parts that the book is made up of.This "we" is the "auto" in the biography, while the patient, the author Patrick Anderson, is presented in the third person as "Patrick".It creates an intellectually stimulating ambiance to follow Patrick through his ordeal.And what an ordeal it was, health wise of course, but also financially and in terms of his utter dependency on the medical establishment.And, throughout the ordeal, there was no certainty that he would live.Still, in many parts of the book, the tone is not dramatic, but rather factual.This may be because many, if not most, of the empirical data originate from his mother's, Deirdre's, meticulous record keeping throughout the whole process.She almost never left her son.She was by his side for every medical appointment.There are of course also empirical data from Anderson himself, but as he writes in the afterword: "returning to the home of my own experience meant grappling with the radical disorientation of that home: in and out of consciousness, through countless fever dreams and hallucinations, weed-picking from the official records of my collapse" (221-222).After reading the book, you can appreciate fully why he dedicates it to his mother and, actually, to all mothers for that matter, "in whatever form they take".For the organizational ethnographer, it is fascinating to read how, quite often by implication, the hierarchies within hospitals are portrayed.Although Anderson could not have done without the medical expertise of the various specialist doctors, it is the nurses that gave him crucial emotional support throughout his time in the hospitals.Indeed, the doctors are, in a number of cases, rather cold and dispassionate -valuable traits in the operating theory, but less so at the bedside.It was the same doctors who doubted that Anderson would ever walk again, while other health professionals encouraged him to hope.According to Diana, a home care worker, the "need to keep wanting" (59, italics in original) is key to getting through a deadly illness like this.In terms of emotional support, it was his