Born from a frustration with today’s sound-bite driven “rolling” news, Pocket Issue titles pull together the background to some of the biggest challenges facing our world – delivering the facts in an independent and quick-to-digest format.

Designed for our time-pressed lives, these short and pithy handbooks quickly brief you with enough facts to join the debate.

New Edition - September 2009

Swine fever, the first flu pandemic of the 21st century, is spreading fast around the globe and is predicted to make an unwelcome and more aggressive return this winter. Make sure you've got the facts. Pocket Issue, Pandemics answers the important questions: What is a pandemic? How does the flu virus spread? Why is a cytokine storm so deadly?

Pandemics offers important context to the recent flu outbreak, tracing past and current Pandemics from the Spanish flu of 1918 to HIV and Malaria. A useful and concise handbook, it assesses global pandemic management techniques, the ethics behind the supply of drugs and asks whether our governments are doing enough.

 
‘A brilliant wheeze: The essence of the debate in a very approachable format’
Harriet Lane, The Observer

Exactly what any busy person needs – the facts at your fingertips! Never get caught out again when a conversation starts on the big issues of our time’
Jeremy Vine, BBC Radio 2 and Panorama

‘For everyone who longs to be well informed but lacks the time (or attention span).’
Alex Clark, The Observer

‘Prep yourself by keeping the one on global warming in the downstairs loo…’
Mary Killen, The Spectator

Precisely what’s needed…’
Hephzibah Anderson, The Daily Mail