- Hardcover: 288 pages
- Publisher: Granta Books; First Edition First Impression edition (8 May 2008)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1847080006
- ISBN-13: 978-1847080004
- Product Dimensions: 23.4 x 15.7 x 3.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 306,087 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Arena
'Using vivid accounts from global frontlines, she shows how political correctness and backward ideology have helped AIDS spread.'
Sunday Times
Gripping and surprisingly entertaining account of the waste, fraud and jaw-dropping arrogance of the Aids industry.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
The come-on title fronts a detailed account of HIV infection investigations in the field - chiefly among sex-workers and drug-users in Jakarta - and a passionate plea for the large sums now made available for AIDS prevention to be decoupled from self-serving political ideologies such as the US's `abstinence' conditions of aid. Listen to the people on the ground, is the message: see how they behave, target money and expertise to produce demonstrable reductions in transmission rates.
Pisani's re-training in epidemiology is grafted on to a tabloid hack's instinct for the jugular and the visceral metaphor (most women don't like the female condom "because it looks like a supermarket shopping bag stuck up your p***y, with handles hanging out the bottom"), allied to a lucid brain for figures from her Far East financial correspondent days. "When people ask me what I do for a living, I say, `Sex and drugs,'" she starts, disarmingly. The hands-on focus on her own work in Indonesia - the book's most readable, and affecting, sections - doesn't stop her comparing other countries' varying situations ("For the same amount of sleeping around, you now have a greater risk of getting infected if you use a condom every single time you have sex in Swaziland than you do if you never use a condom at all in China"), or from taking a global perspective: "When bishops, presidents and the media poke holes in condoms, they become ineffective."
The Wisdom of Whores has a rushed, provisional feel to it - which actually gives a sense of the speed at which responses to AIDS have developed over the past 20-odd years, and are still developing. Though she has tough words for a lot of decision-makers, she gives honour where it is due, to the talented, dedicated researchers and to some government bodies such as Britain's own DfID. There is wisdom and humour in this book, and essential information, too: the section `Back to Basics' ("Forgive me for getting graphic, but as you probably know sex can be a sticky business.") should be compulsory reading for all secondary-age children.
Pisani's re-training in epidemiology is grafted on to a tabloid hack's instinct for the jugular and the visceral metaphor (most women don't like the female condom "because it looks like a supermarket shopping bag stuck up your p***y, with handles hanging out the bottom"), allied to a lucid brain for figures from her Far East financial correspondent days. "When people ask me what I do for a living, I say, `Sex and drugs,'" she starts, disarmingly. The hands-on focus on her own work in Indonesia - the book's most readable, and affecting, sections - doesn't stop her comparing other countries' varying situations ("For the same amount of sleeping around, you now have a greater risk of getting infected if you use a condom every single time you have sex in Swaziland than you do if you never use a condom at all in China"), or from taking a global perspective: "When bishops, presidents and the media poke holes in condoms, they become ineffective."
The Wisdom of Whores has a rushed, provisional feel to it - which actually gives a sense of the speed at which responses to AIDS have developed over the past 20-odd years, and are still developing. Though she has tough words for a lot of decision-makers, she gives honour where it is due, to the talented, dedicated researchers and to some government bodies such as Britain's own DfID. There is wisdom and humour in this book, and essential information, too: the section `Back to Basics' ("Forgive me for getting graphic, but as you probably know sex can be a sticky business.") should be compulsory reading for all secondary-age children.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This really is a page-turner, a compulsive read, which is an extraordinary feat for a book about the AIDS epidemic (and I speak as an 'insider' who is punch drunk with writing and reading about this topic). Pisani shoots from the hip, always, which is challenging and stimulating, but she always pins her arguments down with good quality and compelling data. Even when I was happy to find myself saying mentally, "Yes but..." (because it's nice not to feel you are being led by the nose by a good talker!) I found the author answering my queries, settling my doubts, a little further on in the text. I think it's a great book, and an important one -- it forces us to confront our failures in preventing the spread of HIV, so often because of squeamishness, prejudice or lack of courage to acknowledge who is really at risk and why, and unpreparedness to spend the huge dollops of money where it is most needed.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Studying for a masters in medical ethics one frequently encounters learned articles that try to perform the laudable task of enlightening us to the crucial moral issues relating to the HIV pandemic. Research uncovers seriously complicated articles and thought processes, which are in turn, interspersed with references to even more learned journals, ascending from the erudite to the downright impenetrable. Complex philosophical arguments stem from the thoughts of some of the greatest minds on earth and you begin to wonder - what this has to do with what is happening on the kerb? Then like a light or a refreshing breeze someone else's voice permeates through. The voice speaks in plain English, is not overawed by inflated and grandiose titles and with the cheek of a good journalist asks the right uncomfortable questions. Just for a moment we are asked to stop making decisions based on the ideas that trickle downwards, and find the ideas that float upwards. Let's ask the very ordinary, sensible, resourceful, intelligent people that this epidemic is effecting what their views are. Unsurprisingly one discovers that they are very ordinary people who generally are doing what they do through force of circumstance not through any innate wickedness. "There but for the grace of God ....etc." They also have very straightforward ideas of their own as to the whys and wherefores, as well as solutions which they utilize. Irreverent and iconoclastic, but substantiated by facts, this was a refreshing expose of the self-perpetuating AIDS industry and a useful source of ideas. If you want to come up for air, this is the way to do it. Highly recommend for all, not just for academic study.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
More off with their foreskins than off with their goolies
Read for yourself how even our world expert author admits to occasional laxity in condom use under the throes of passion. Read more
Published 14 months ago by Mr. N. Foale
A must read!
Pisani's writing style is awesome; very engaging, direct and humorous in the right places. This is a fascinatng journey into her world and provides masses of food for thought!! Read more
Published 22 months ago by simonsimple
Genuinely enjoy getting the facts straight
I am seldom found without at least one book close at hand, and end up trying to give books away in order to keep my shelves from collapsing. Read more
Published on 19 Jun 2008 by T. Elisabeth Wennevold
Superb! An excelent book for the layman or scholar
Dr. Pisani is a rarity in that she is a scientist who can write! She is a former journalist turned epidemiologist (aka "epi")working in AIDs research amd prevention. Read more
Published on 3 Jun 2008 by David C. Hackney
Witty, no nonsense read
This makes a subject - HIV prevention and its politics - which is sensitive, both politically and socially, accessible and dare I say, funny. Read more
Published on 2 Jun 2008 by LolaDSmith
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