The Wisdom of Whores: Bureaucrats, Brothels, and the Business of AIDS - Hardcover

Pisani, Elizabeth

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0393066622 ISBN 13: 9780393066623

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, 2008

Synopsis

A flame-throwing epidemiologist talks about sex, drugs, and the mistakes (dismal), ideologies (vicious), and hopes (realistic) of international AIDS prevention.

When people ask Elizabeth Pisani what she does for a living, she says, "sex and drugs." As an epidemiologist researching AIDS, she's been involved with international efforts to halt the disease for fourteen years. With swashbuckling wit and fierce honesty, she dishes on herself and her colleagues as they try to prod reluctant governments to fund HIV prevention for the people who need it most―drug injectors, gay men, sex workers, and johns.Pisani chats with flamboyant Indonesian transsexuals about their boob jobs and watches Chinese streetwalkers turn away clients because their SUVs aren't nice enough. With verve and clarity, she shows the general reader how her profession really works; how easy it is to draw wrong conclusions from "objective" data; and, shockingly, how much money is spent so very badly. "Exhibit A": the 45 billion taxpayer dollars the Bush administration is committing to international AIDS programs. 12 illustrations

About this title

About the Author:

Elizabeth Pisani has lived in Indonesia at various times over the past twenty-five years, originally as a journalist and later as an HIV epidemiologist. The author of The Wisdom of Whores and Indonesia Etc., she is based in London.

Review:

'[A] rollicking, eye-opening, hilarious account of the underbelly of international AIDS research ... Forget everything you've ever gleaned from boilerplate stories about AIDS research: The Wisdom of Whores vibrates with "I've been there" authenticity' Philadelphia Enquirer 'An absorbing read - Her book has freshness, charm and innocence, reminding us of the core elements that remain at the heart of this epidemic' Independent '[A] wonderful book on the salamagundi of money, politics, hypocrisy and obduracy (or possibly just plain stupidity) in what she calls the business of AidsA"' Telegraph 'A beguilingly rigorous expose - engaging, well written and entertaining' Times 'A major book' Daily Telegraph 'Pisani packs quite a punch. Her book - ignited a mini-firestorm of controversy - It exploded several prevalent myths about the diseases' Irish Sunday Independent

About this edition

• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0393066622
• ISBN 13: 9780393066623
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 400