"In recent years, health has become a pressing issue in international politics - a development which has been reflected in the growth of academic literature on the subject. The emergence of new (and re-emergence of old) infectious diseases since the early 1990s has attracted scholarly interest from various fields of investigation. At the same time, in a European context, the dramatic rise in tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS in some former East Bloc countries has been a cause of particular concern. This timely work provides a detailed account of how the states around the Baltic Sea have met the challenge of communicable diseases and used health issues as an instrument in their foreign policy more widely."--Provided by publisher.