English Summary/英文概要： Allergy truly is a modern malady. Only one hundred years ago, the term ’allergy’ was unknown, and diseases subsequently identified as allergic in nature, such as asthma, hayfever, eczema and food intolerance, were routinely considered to be rare, non-fatal conditions primarily afflicting the cultured and civilized classes of Western society. By the closing decade of the twentieth century, however, allergy had acquired greater medical, political, socio-economic and cultural significance. Increasingly perceived by clinicians, the media and the public as widespread and potentially fatal conditions, allergies became a distinct clinical specialism, generated new diagnostic and therapeutic strategies, and, in the process, created a lucrative market for international pharmaceutical, cosmetic and food industries. Charting entirely new territory in the social history of medicine, Mark Jackson’s book offers critical insights not only into the emergence of new categories of illness in the modern period but also into the historical geography of disease. In doing so, it presents a new perspective on the history of health, medicine and the environment and provides a challenging commentary on the global politics, economics and ideologies of health care in the civilized and industrialized modern world.

Chinese Summary/中文概要： 过敏确实是一种现代疾病。仅在一百年前，“过敏”一词还不为人所知，随后才被确定为过敏性疾病的疾病，如哮喘、花粉热、湿疹和食物不耐症，通常被认为是罕见的、非致命的疾病，主要折磨着西方社会的文化和文明阶层。然而，到了二十世纪的最后十年，过敏症已经具有了更大的医学、政治、社会经济和文化意义。越来越多的临床医生、媒体和公众认为过敏症是一种广泛且可能致命的疾病。过敏症成为一种独特的临床专业，产生了新的诊断和治疗策略，并在此过程中为国际制药、化妆品和食品行业创造了一个利润丰厚的市场。马克·杰克逊的书描绘了医学社会史的全新领域，不仅对现代新疾病类别的出现，而且对疾病的历史地理提供了批判性的见解。通过这样做，它对卫生、医学和环境的历史提出了新的观点，并对文明和工业化现代世界的全球政治、经济和卫生保健意识形态进行了富有挑战性的评论。（WYL）

Mark Jackson is Professor of the History of Medicine and Director of the Centre for Medical History at the University of Exeter. He is Reviews Editor of The Social History of Medicine and the author of many books including New-Born Child Murder: Women, Illegitimacy and the Courts in Eighteenth-Century England (1996), and The Borderland of Imbecility: Medicine, Society and the Fabrication of the Feeble Mind in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (2000).