Just Finished Reading: The Immune System – A Very Short Introduction by Paul Klenerman (FP: 2017)

 

I’ve been meaning to do something like this for a while now – a VSI Book Blitz on Pandemics. The plan was to start small and personal and then expand outwards. So the Immune System seemed the ideal place to start out from. Now I haven’t formally studied anything Biological for a LONG time (around 40 years I’d say) so I’m definitely a bit rusty and frankly out of touch with present understanding of such things which is one of the reasons for playing catch-up. So I wasn’t totally surprised to find that around the first quarter of the book was a tad above my pay-grade knowledge wise! But I did think that the reading level of the book throughout – when it either dropped to my level of understanding or moved into areas I was more familiar with (in other words away from bio-chemistry!) – was above the general reader level. More than once I did think it was aimed more at GP’s or trainee doctors who just needed an appreciation of the subject or maybe a quick refresher course.

Despite all that I did find myself learning quite a bit here from how exactly the Immune System worked – recognising self from non-self for instance as well as how it developed a ‘memory’ for previous infections and then how it fails by either under or over performing its tasks. All very interesting and it did give me a very good base from which to move forward with my next VSI Pandemic reading. If you’re coming from a point of only a vague appreciation of human biology this might be a rather daunting read. If you’re made of sterner stuff or have a few years of college education in biology under your belt (but are somewhat out of touch with things) this will definitely bring you up to date. An interesting read if rather a challenging one!