Member Reviews
Note: I received a free unpublished proof of this book, for a limited time, in exchange for an honest review. All opinions here are my own.
This book is about medicinal chemistry, Chicago, Yugoslavians, and massive acts of fraud. Of course I had to review it. I will read nearly any book on any one of those topics, so long as I think it is good and well-researched.
Unfortunately, I didn’t get started on this one until later rather than sooner, so I didn’t get around to finishing it, but I read enough of the book that I feel I can give it a sufficient review.
The main topic of the book is right on the tin—it’s about how staff at the University of Illinois bought into a fake cancer drug created and promoted by a couple of Yugoslavian businessmen back in the 50’s. The book talks about the general background of the period, such as who was in charge at University of Illinois and what the school was like back then; various contemporary events, figures, and issues; and the state of medicinal chemistry as a field. This information helps to establish some important factors—University of Illinois was attracting some talented and well-known people, they were doing some research there, and everybody wanted to find the one drug that would cure all of cancer, which was seen as one disease with one common cause. (No, there is not actually one drug that will cure all cancers, but this was the 1950’s. We were not yet there in our understanding of oncology.)
The book then covers the general narrative of what happened—how people at U of I heard about Krebiozen, how it was advertised and promoted, the information that its creators gave about it, and the sorts of tests and studies performed to investigate its utility. The drug’s reputation took off, with people around the world requesting it and many people being treated with the drug, even when the U of I researchers promoting it didn’t know what it actually was.
Of course, people eventually began to get suspicious of Krebiozen, and there was a massive amount of controversy, in which Krebiozen skeptics and detractors were accused of trying to stop people from getting cancer treatment in order to make more money. However, after tests were done and it was proven to not be an effective cancerdrug, there was a massive amount of upset around that as well, and many people’s reputations took a hit.
I liked this book enough that I’m probably going to get a copy of it myself and re-read it, not just because I read most of this in 48 hours and didn’t remember much, but because it’s a genuinely good book on the topic. Ehrlich cites a great deal of primary sources on the Krebiozen scandal, including a lot of information from U of I’s own archives. While there may be some points on which there is some controversy or disagreement, it seems to be more than just a bunch of made-up history.
Overall, I recommend this book to anybody interested in medical hoaxes, strange pieces of Chicago history, the very niche history of Yugoslavians in the US, and intriguing bits of medicinal chemistry lore.
A compelling account of the cancer cure that wasn't and the very protracted public legal/regulatory fight to uncover its efficacy, composition, even existence from 1951-64. Wild. As ever, the place where medicine and hope meet is ripe for fraud. How great to have this journalist's digestible narrative of one stellar example to teach us.
In the 1950s, many were loath to say the word “cancer.” A diagnosis left patients searching for a cure, any cure. Matthew Erlich’s “The Kreboizen Hoax” discusses the degree to which people will search for a miracle cure to what has been called “the emperor of all maladies.”
The book features the generalized mistrust people have toward the medical community and how quacks can gain a foothold. It traces the long history of quackery in the United States and how easy misinformation (and disinformation) can gain a foothold. This isn’t just a story about cancer treatment hoaxes, but a more generalized story about how people react when facing an illness they believe is a death sentence.
I love a good medical or medicine-related history and have several in my classroom. This one is particularly dense, but students would find the introduction interesting as it is a thorough outline of the story.
This book is great for people who enjoy medical histories or stories about the 1950s and 1960s.
I received an advance review copy for free from NetGalley and University of Illinois Press, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
This was a WILD ride. I always enjoy non-fiction medical books about interesting cases that have happened or diseases that have been discovered or accidents that have occurred in labs. This was slightly different than anything I’ve ever read b/c this whole book is based on a medication that truly never existed, but had a doctor literally putting his career and intellect on the line.
Dr. Ivy seems to be a brilliant doctor, and he seems to genuinely care about finding a cure for cancer which is what got him obsessed with krebozian. The problem is, Dr. Ivy was not a cancer researcher, so he really wasn’t qualified to be testing this medicine on patients. He didn’t seem to cause any harm as the medicine didn’t seem to be anything dangerous, but the fact that he was willing to keep using a drug that he had absolutely no idea what was in it, seems extremely reckless.
The creators of krebiozan definitely seemed to be con artists looking for a mark and found one in Dr. Ivy. The only thing I found frustrating about this book is that I felt like we never truly found out what krebozian was. The FDA never got a large enough sample to do multiple tests. But that didn’t ruin the book for me, it still provided a lot of detailed information to keep it quite interesting.
This book is a history about Krebiozen, an alleged cure for cancer that was famous in the '50s, the subject of protest and litigation in the '60s, and faded to nothing in the '70s as the grifters cashed out and got out. Central to the story is Doctor Andrew Ivy, a physiologist with polymath-like accomplishments, who was…well, what exactly was Ivy doing is a question that the author tries to get at.
Ivy was an advocate of Krebiozen and fought for its acceptance. (He was not its inventor.) Many of his contemporaries saw through it, including George Stoddard, the president of University of Illinois, where Ivy worked. Ivy would draw flack from organizations, including the AMA and FDA, over Krebiozen. He would draw support from a much wider base of individuals. And that is what makes this book so good.
The author explains this story in the context of a broader history, elevating the book to something other than an (admittedly fun) story of a con job over a failed nostrum. Unlike some hoaxes, the science is never there. Instead, Krebiozen gets tied into what we would now recognize as the culture wars, as well as the Chicago Machine, with a plotline driven by the rise of the administrative state and its successes, particularly the FDA, but also the distrust in the administrative state that inspired, by people in desperate health situations but also by politicians willing to use any fracture for votes.
And unlike many hoaxes, there is the frustrating figure of Ivy, a skeptic for other snake oil who bought into this one, who would often profess restraint while going along with the hype, and who, like Krebiozen itself, fades as opposed to blows up.
The book is great, in contention for best of the year for me. The writing is no-nonsense. The author has a good sense for how to level and layer detail, what to focus on, when, and how much, to make the reading both easy and comprehensive. The underlying research is detailed. The story has resonances in all manner of medical hoaxes - Theranos, the vaccine theory of autism, Ivermectin- while being distinct. The author draws useful comparisons to other scams and hoaxes enough to make the point and without overstating any argument. The book is light on conclusions, but that is due to the intractability of the problems, and the competing values of elites, anti-elites, the democratic process, and human suffering.
More than a book about a hoax, it is a book investigating the reasons hoaxes exist. With surprise appearances from Rachel Carlson, Gloria Swanson, and Vito Marzullo.
My thanks to the author, Matthew C. Ehrlich, for writing the book, and to the publisher, 3 Fields Books, for making the ARC available to me.