The Formula for Better Health

The formula to stop invisible killers—an approach that can protect your health and prevent the next pandemic—from one of the most influential public health leaders in the US.

In The Formula for Better Health, Tom Frieden—named “the most influential leader in American public health since C. Everett Koop” by former Mayor Michael Bloomberg—reveals how to defeat the world’s deadliest diseases.

Drawing from decades leading New York City’s health department after 9/11, directing the CDC during the Ebola epidemic, and fighting tuberculosis and other lethal threats in India and around the world, Frieden combines compelling stories with insider knowledge to show you how to win the battle for health.

In this book, you will step into laboratories that solve mysteries and expose deadly deceptions. You’ll meet a trailblazing epidemiologist who survived a Nazi concentration camp, a seventeenth-century cloth merchant who discovered public health’s superpower, and a brilliant Irish doctor knighted for unlocking the cure for tuberculosis. You’ll also learn how disease detectives ended the largest outbreak of drug-resistant tuberculosis in the United States, what caused the deadliest mistake during the COVID pandemic, and why we ignore urgent medical warnings. Most importantly, you’ll find out how to stop today’s leading killers.

Using critical insights from real-world successes and failures, The Formula for Better Health bridges the lethal gap between scientific knowledge and life-saving action. Whether you want to protect your own health, safeguard your community, or solve seemingly impossible health challenges—or all three—this book offers realistic hope and a clear path to a healthier future.Preface – Disease Detectives
Part One: See
1: The Invisible
2: What Blinds Us
3: The Pathway to Progress
Part Two: Believe
4: A Healthy Future is Within Reach
Part Three: Do
5: Organize
6: Implement
7: Communicate
8: Challenge
Part Four: The Solution
9: A Post-Cassandra-Curse World
10: The Formula For Your Health
Conclusion: Clearing the Mystery
Appendix: Ready-Reference Guide
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SourcesFeatured in Chasing Life with Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Science Friday, Bloomberg, Fortune, PBS NewsHour, Le Monde, the Next Big Idea Club, New York magazine’s the Intelligencer, NPR Open to Debate, and more.

“Compelling … powerful and memorable … touching … refreshing …enough to pep up the most hard-bitten cynic …Hope is what The Formula For Better Health is best at giving us with its message that public health still has a place – and an important one – in creating a better world… Exactly what is needed at this moment in time.”
—The Lancet

"A well-researched argument for the central role of public health in saving lives... the author balances the book’s academic underpinnings with an engaging writing style that will be accessible to readers outside of the medical profession."
—Kirkus Reviews “Clear solutions for today’s deadliest health threats."
—Elizabeth Kolbert, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for The Sixth Extinction

"The Formula for Better Health provides unique, critical insight into stopping epidemics and preventing deadly diseases from one of the most successful health leaders in a generation.”
—Anthony S. Fauci, MD, Former Chief Medical Advisor to the President of United States; author of New York Times #1 best-selling memoir On Call: A Doctor’s Journey in Public Service

“A superb book. Read it! The life you save might be your own.”
—Cass R. Sunstein, author of Climate Justice and Nudge

“A masterclass in improving health at scale. Frieden transforms decades of global experience into actionable insights to protect and improve your health and that of your family, community, our nation and our world.”
—Helene Gayle, MD, President Emerita, Spelman College and former President and CEO of the international organization CARE

“Based on a masterful distillation of global health victories, Dr. Frieden reveals critical personal and community steps for longer, healthier lives.”
—Bill Frist, MD, former United States Senate Majority Leader and co-chair of the Future of Health Advisory Board at the Bipartisan Policy Center

“Tom Frieden is the most effective health messenger there is. His book, The Formula for Better Health is succinct, specific, and powerful.”
—Dr. Frank Luntz, Political Commentator, Analyst, and Pollster

"A powerful guide to better health from one of the world's leading health experts. As we face today's urgent threats, Tom Frieden offers a path forward with trademark clarity and wisdom.”
—Vivek Murthy, MD, former Surgeon General of the United States and author of the New York Times Bestseller Together: The Healing Power of Connection in a Sometimes Lonely WorldDr. Tom Frieden helped stop deadly outbreaks in New York City, directed the CDC under President Obama while leading the agency’s response to Ebola and other threats, and is now CEO of Resolve to Save Lives, a global organization that partners with countries to prevent millions of deaths.