Tipping Point Ch. 1 Summary

In The Tipping Point, by Malcolm Gladwell, he raises the issue of social awarness with explaining epidemics and how they get started in three different rules.

The first chapter discusses that epidemics need to be started by three different rules: The Law of the Few, Stickiness Factor, and Power of Context. He uses the syphilis problem that occured in Baltimore Maryland in the mid 1990's to help us better understand epidemics and how it can be started. Basically there is more than one way to tip an epidemic.

Epidemics are a function of people who promotes the infectious agent, the infectios agent itself, as well as the enviorment in which the agent is operating in.

That is exactly how the syphilis outbreak started in Baltimore Maryland. It was started in three different ways: The drug problem increased risky sexual behavior failing for people to be unsafe and not educated or smart about their chocies in behavior. The second was the cut back in medical assistance in the city, and the third was the housing projects being torn down. Each one of these examples caused for this disease to spread outragiously. This happened with only a small population of people, which explains the 20/80 rule.

He wraps up the end of the chapter by stating the three laws of the epidemic, and giving you s preview of what is up ahead. He also asks questions at the end of the chapter to get the readers mind prepared for what they can think about after they close the book, and letting the reader know that the three rules will be later explored in more detail.