In The Weariness, the Fever, and the Fret Katherine McCuaig takes an in-depth look at the campaign against TB, from its beginnings as part of the turn-of-the-century urban social reform movement to the 1950s and the discovery of antibiotics that could cure it. Although the bacillus that causes it had been discovered in 1882, at the turn of the century TB was, as Osler observed, "a social disease with a medical aspect." With "fresh air, good food, good houses, and hope" as the only available treatment, fighting the disease meant not only eliminating the germ but attacking the underlying social...

Cancer is now the leading cause of death in Canada, yet many recent studies have drawn attention to problems in cancer control, such as long waiting times for treatment, inequitable access to care, and variations in treatment. An Element of Hope traces the early development of cancer programs in Canada from the discovery of radium in 1898 to the end of World War II. During this period radium emerged as a promising new therapy and governments sought to mount a societal response to cancer. Charles Hayter chronicles the work of Canadian provinces in establishing the cancer programs that remain...