Our viral futures : a political ecology of microbes / Charlotte Brives ; foreword by Bruno Latour.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Brives, Charlotte, 1981- author.

Series:

Science now

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Bacteriophages.

Drug resistance in microorganisms.

Evidence-based medicine.

Microbial ecology.

Environmental Microbiology.

Drug Resistance, Bacterial.

Medical Subjects:

Environmental Microbiology.

Bacteriophages.

Drug Resistance, Bacterial.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xi, 262 pages) : illustrations.

Place of Publication:

New York : Columbia University Press, [2026]

Summary:

Increasing bacterial resistance to antibiotics is one of today's greatest threats to public health. Yet a possible solution has emerged from a surprising source. Phage therapy deploys viruses called bacteriophages, "bacteria eaters," to treat bacterial infections. What concerns--both biological and social--arise from using viruses in this way? What does phage therapy reveal about the links between humans and microbes? In Our Viral Futures, Charlotte Brives examines the development and implications of this therapy, providing new ways to understand our interconnections with the microbial world. Considering patients seeking treatment for chronic infections, the establishment of new regulatory frameworks, and the processes of laboratory research and clinical trials, she highlights the complexity and variety of the relationships among humans, phages, and bacteria. Brives places phage therapy in the context of the widespread use of antibiotics under industrial capitalism, which has deployed these treatments in order to enable ecologically devastating forms of mass production and consumption. She argues that the connections between human societies and microbial communities defy the usual categories through which science and medicine understand the world, giving rise to new moral and political questions. Interdisciplinary and nuanced, Our Viral Futures poses a provocative challenge: Instead of continuing to assert that we can control and master microbes, we must learn to coexist with them.

Contents:

Tensions

Alternative histories

Microgeohistories

Pluribiosis

Pluribiotic medicine

Evidence-based medicine

Antibiotic infrastructures

Recalcitrance and ferality

Toward a pluribiotic model?.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Online resource; title from PDF title page (De Gruyter Brill, viewed March 12, 2026).

Other Format:

Print version: Brives, Charlotte, 1981- Our viral futures

ISBN:

9780231564007

0231564007

9780231564953

0231564953

OCLC:

1569674094

Publisher Number:

CIPO000326446

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license