Tag: john-green

CURING DISEASE

Green questions the profit motive of drug companies that ignore the benefits of drugs that poor societies cannot afford that would cure tuberculosis. At the same time, Green implies the political will of all nations fail to provide known curative drugs for tuberculosis.

Books of Interest
 Website: chetyarbrough.blog

Everything is Tuberculosis (The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection)

Author: John Green

Narration by: John Green

John Green (Author, YouTuber, and philanthropist.)

“Everything is Tuberculosis” is an apt title for John Green’s book but unlikely to attract many listener/readers. However, those who have read John Green’s books are attracted to his story because of the humor and insight he offers to living life. Green offers an interesting human perspective about a disease that kills hundreds of thousands of people every year and is both preventable and curable. Recognizing this critic’s own biases, “Everything is Tuberculosis” is a belief that there are only two important issues for human species’ survival, i.e., world peace and personal health. “Everything is Tuberculosis” deals with the principal of health while others write about world peace.

Tuberculosis transmission.

Peace is only indirectly addressed in “Everything is Tuberculosis” while health is the primary focus of Green’s book. Today, approximately 1.23 million people die from tuberculosis every year. Surprisingly, it remains the deadliest curable infectious disease in the world. An estimated 10.7 million people are presently diagnosed with tuberculosis. This high infection rate is for a disease that is curable and preventable. Green explains in countries with high rates of poverty, undernutrition, overcrowding, high HIV infections, and poor medical services tuberculosis becomes a greater killer of human beings than any other infectious disease.

The fear and anxiety of Covid mimics the fear of tuberculosis.

Green personalizes his story by being its main character. He writes in the first person and uses his personal anxiety driven thoughts to explain tuberculosis’ illness and vulnerability. As a child, Green recalls his own illnesses and anxieties that required hospitalization. He contrasts his life of economic security with the lives of many people in the world that have little to no economic security. He views tuberculosis, not as a scientist or patient, but as an observer of poverty in Sierra Leone and the personal life of a young boy with the disease.

The cost of medication.

The young boy’s recovery experience is on-again/off-again, in part because of his father’s skepticism about the effectiveness of drugs and his belief in God, but also because of a failure of experimental drug treatments from other tuberculosis patients that die. There is a happy ending when a new drug cure is found and started; the boy recovers, resulting in eradication of the infection. He finishes high school and goes on to college. Other stories of the disease in Sierra Leone show distances patients have to travel, the cost of treatments, and different economically challenged families who are discouraged by continued treatment. Those patients that do not continue the medical treatment often see regrowth of the Tuberculosis bacteria which ends their sons, daughters, fathers, or mother’s lives.

Green’s point is that human beings are dying from tuberculosis, a curable disease that kills; not because it is often fatal, but because of a human-systems’ failure.

TB deaths are a predictable outcome of poverty, undernutrition, overcrowding, political neglect, and global indifference. Green gets at the heart of the problem of societal indifference. The indifference is both political and economic. The political indifference comes from every government that is only concerned about their country’s health and welfare. The economic difference is similar but more pronounced in capitalist countries that focus on profit more than societal benefit. Political difference is in nation-state’ leadership whether countries are democratic or other.

Green questions the profit motive of drug companies that ignore the benefits of drugs that poor societies cannot afford that would cure tuberculosis. At the same time, Green implies the political will of all nations fail to provide known curative drugs for tuberculosis.

LIFE’S MEANING

John Green explains in “The Anthropocene Reviewed” that learning how to cope with life when its hard or joyful is what it is to be human.

Books of Interest
 Website: chetyarbrough.blog

The Anthropocene Reviewed (Essays on a Human-Centered Planet)

Author: John Green

Narration by: John Green

John Michael Green (Author, Indianapolis native, raised in Florida, now living in Indianapolis, graduated from Kenyon College, with degrees in English and religious studies.)

“The Anthropocene…” is a clever series of essays that reveal a biography of John Green’s beliefs and how they have been affected by the world. Born in Indianapolis, he is raised in Florida and returns to Indianapolis when his wife is offered a job as an Art Director. These essays are drawn from his life experience, candidly revealing beliefs about himself and human activities that shape the earth’s climate, ecosystems, and geological processes. Green writes about his understanding of the diversity of things ranging from cosmic events like Halley’s comet to his obsessive consumption of Diet Dr Pepper. Along the way, Green reflects on the big and small events of life that reflect on many Americans lives.

Defining anxiety in oneself.

Green appears to be more anxiety driven than most people. His growth as a writer is shown to be related to his childhood memories, his personal illnesses, and his life encounters. That seems true for all human beings which is why his essays appeal to listener/readers of his famous stories like “The Fault in Our Stars” and “Turtles All the Way Down”. Of course, writing success in life, like all achievements, come with cost. Personal emotions and the environment in which we live shape our lives in good and bad ways. Greens self-analysis reflects on his anxieties, vulnerabilities, and wonderment. He writes of close relationships that helped him get through his school years. His illnesses are partly brought on by anxiety and depression which are not uncommon in any society. The difference is that Green is able to write about them with candor and humor to make reader/listeners more comfortable with their own experiences.

Life is life.

What Green reminds this listener of is a saying that my daughter hates to hear. “Life is life”. We deal with life in our own way, i.e., colored by who we are from our genetic inheritance, our personal strengths and weaknesses, and the way we deal with the circumstances in which we live. Green creates a 5 star rating system for experiences in his life. Histories of the bubonic plague and the world’s most recent experience with the covid pandemic receive 1 star. Natural sunsets, the song “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, and the Lascaux ancient cave paintings get 5 stars in Green’s opinion. These ratings are Green’s way of explaining suffering, healing, and the beauty of art in our lives. The beauty of nature, civilization’s artful adaptation, the closeness of family, professional help, and music have helped him cope with anxiety and depression. They also show what he finds beautiful, what he fears losing, and what he believes is worth saving.

What is the meaning of life?

The depth of a person’s feelings are not the same for all human beings, but we all have a rating system for what life means to us. Humans need to understand they are not alone in happiness or sorrow. John Green explains in “The Anthropocene Reviewed” that learning how to cope with life when its hard or joyful is what it is to be human.