Why do diseases of poverty afflict more people in wealthy countries than in the developing world?

In 2011, Dr. Peter J. Hotez relocated to Houston to launch Baylor’s National School of Tropical Medicine. He was shocked to discover that a number of neglected diseases often associated with developing countries were widespread in impoverished Texas communities. Despite the United States’ economic prowess and first-world status, an estimated 12 million Americans living at the poverty level currently suffer from at least one neglected tropical disease, or NTD. Hotez concluded that the world’s neglected diseases—which include tuberculosis, hookworm infection, lymphatic filariasis, Chagas disease, and leishmaniasis—are born first and foremost of extreme poverty.

In this book, Hotez describes a new global paradigm known as “blue marble health,” through which he asserts that poor people living in wealthy countries account for most of the world’s poverty-related illness. He explores the current state of neglected diseases in such disparate countries as Mexico, South Korea, Argentina, Australia, the United States, Japan, and Nigeria. By crafting public policy and relying on global partnerships to control or eliminate some of the world’s worst poverty-related illnesses, Hotez believes, it is possible to eliminate life-threatening disease while at the same time creating unprecedented opportunities for science and diplomacy.

Clear, compassionate, and timely, Blue Marble Health is a must-read for leaders in global health, tropical medicine, and international development, along with anyone committed to helping the millions of people who are caught in the desperate cycle of poverty and disease.

Peter J. Hotez, MD, PhD, is the Texas Children's Hospital Endowed Chair in Tropical Pediatrics and the director of the Texas Children's Hospital Center for Vaccine Development at Baylor College of Medicine, where he is also the dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine. In 2015 he was selected as a US Science Envoy for the State Department and the White House. He is the author of Vaccines Did Not Cause Rachel's Autism: My Journey as a Vaccine Scientist, Pediatrician, and Autism Dad, and Forgotten People, Forgotten Diseases: The Neglected Tropical Diseases and Their Impact on Global Health and Development.