"Despite remarkable successes, Galea argues, public health succumbed to a disturbing strain of illiberalism during the pandemic. . . .Galea makes a powerful case that to carry the worst illiberal outcomes from the pandemic into the next crisis would be a devastating mistake."

Pamela Paul | The New York Times

"Galea is a good companion in navigating readers through the political thickets in which public health now operates. [Within Reason] is not about COVID-19, but the pandemic was an enormous stress test of public health and thrust public health into the center of politics and media attention."

The Lancet

"In Within Reason, Galea provides a collection of his own essays to explore how the pandemic impacted public health in the US, alongside other general issues the pandemic exposed. In addition to providing incisive analysis on this topic, Galea’s essays provide a powerful and thought-provoking look at the trends in public health that were accelerated due to the pandemic."

Choice

"Within Reason provides a lucid examination of how the pandemic set in motion a gradual disenchantment with many of the liberal values that underlie the work of public health. For readers who are receptive, the book delivers a thoughtful set of ideas for moving forward while, at the same time, reclaiming a liberal approach to public health policy."

Health Affairs

"Erudite, well written and thought-provoking."

The Spinoff Review of Books

"Galea’s book certainly covers many of the issues facing public health today and as such is required reading for those in the discipline or even those dependent on it for policy formation. . . .Galea is trying to resurrect the public health discipline from the illiberal quagmire of its ideological politicalization by re-founding it on liberalism. The question is whether public health, and to some extent science itself, can be resurrected within reason."

Metascience

"[Within Reason] considers the case for a liberal public health policy, presenting reflections on the issues facing the field of public health in the United States and the efforts to establish and sustain a liberal public health policy. Examines the structural forces that shape health and how they have been shaped by the illiberalism of the contemporary political sphere."

Journal of Economic Literature

"Accessible. . . Galea has the style of a tutor who doesn’t heap his readers with unwarranted show-and-tell sympathy. When it comes to complex issues such as the economy, ideas, inequality, health, technology, policy, and politics, he is there, engaging the audience with parables. It is not difficult to be on board with him."

The Hindustan Times

“Powerful, erudite, and immersive—an essential treatise on our needed reformation in public health.”

Alonzo Plough | Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

“With equal dose of empathy and examination, Sandro Galea challenges us to undertake a deep exercise of self-reflection: how our hard-won political beliefs may betray us in the hope for a greater good. Within Reason is critically relevant for each of us—and all of us.”

Julio Frenk | University of Miami