In Strangling Angel, Michael Dwyer chronicles a nation’s crusade against a disease which might best be described as the embodiment of a parent’s nightmare. The moniker that lends this book its title refers to diphtheria, an infection characterised by the growth of a ‘leathery membrane in the lower airways’, often resulting in death by suffocation (p. 2). In Ireland, this menace loomed large and was, Dwyer contends, ‘one of the leading causes of child mortality’ in the nineteenth and early twentieth century (p. 5). The scourge of diphtheria was eventually quashed by the successful implementation of a nationwide childhood immunisation programme. While not unique among infectious diseases for provoking a heated and at times hotly contested public health campaign, the story of the fight against diphtheria has much to add to our understandings of health and medicine in the early decades of Irish independence.

中文翻译：

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书评：扼杀天使：爱尔兰的白喉和儿童免疫接种

在扼杀天使迈克尔·德威尔（Michael Dwyer）记录了一个国家对一种疾病的十字军东征，这种疾病最好被描述为父母噩梦的化身。赋予该书标题的绰号是白喉，这种感染的特征是“下呼吸道的皮膜生长”，常常导致窒息死亡（第2页）。Dwyer辩称，在爱尔兰，这种威胁隐约可见，在19世纪和20世纪初是“导致儿童死亡的主要原因之一”（第5页）。成功实施了全国性的儿童免疫规划，最终消除了白喉的祸害。尽管在传染病中并不是唯一引起激怒，有时甚至是激烈竞争的公共卫生运动的疾病，