Conleth O’Mahoney
Y9479886
To what extent and why did concerns and interventions on matters of public health change between 1500 and 1930?
It is easy to assume that the story of public health over five centuries was solely a progressive one. This, as with many other historical topics, is hardly ever the case. The concerns that drove public health over this time did not change, but overall emphasis shifted from one area to another. Concerns include religion, economics, political objectives, contemporary and general medical understanding. Interventions rather than being the adaptation of scientific understanding and advances were often fuelled by older but generally accepted concepts. A continuous trend in the history of public health was
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From the early nineteenth century this was coupled with dirt or filth, to rationalise contamination and disease causation (Jenner, 2004, p.286; Nutton, 1990). Much as the removal of both bad air and filth have gone hand in hand long before the sixteenth century, it was for quite some time an regular preventative endeavour which was often left only to combat rather than prevent disease (Cipolla, 1992, p.10; Jenner, 2004,p.286; Source Book. 1, 6.1). It is important to bear in mind that these were observable factors and it was something that could physically be dealt with, and certainly improved overall health, whether done for the right reasons or not (Brunton, 2004, p 207; Jenner, …show more content…
Much as medical experts were part of emergency health boards, these were often never called so groups comprised of non-medical personnel handled anything below epidemic levels (Renzi, 2004, p.142). This left policy and intervention open to class bias coupled with limited medical knowledge. Waves of plague resulted in a belief that disease came from the morally corrupted poor and thus gave the state and it’s administrators a reason to intervene (Slack, 1985; Source Book 1, 6.2, 6.3; Wear, 2000, p.284). Interventions were harsh, from evictions to the prohibition of local death rites and long held community customs (Source Book 1, 6.2). It was a classist moral and social policing of those least able to meet their standards, as a result much resentment built against authorities and public health officials (Slack, 1985; Source Book 1,
Roos, Anna Marie E. "Plague, Early History." Infectious Diseases: In Context. Ed. Brenda Wilmoth Lerner and K. Lee Lerner. Vol. 2. Detroit: Gale, 2008. 627-634. In Context Series. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 17 Mar. 2014.
Before discussing how disease has shaped history and altered cultures, it is important to understand how they themselves have developed and changed throughout history. Disease, in the broadest definition of the word, has been present since the beginning of humanity. Even ...
Topic/Thesis: The main idea of this essay is to recall the events and horrors of the Black Death. This is the plague that ravaged the world from 1347 to 1352 (History.com Staff). Tuchman describes the journey of the pestilence and how it affects each country and their individual cities. Tuchman also specifically gives the death tolls of major cities and different groups that were affected. She demonstrates how the plague that struck Europe and other parts of the world resulted in filth, fear and chaos. This essay discusses and reports various personal accounts to the disaster of the Black Death. Tuchman clearly defines what forms the plague came in and how it affected different areas. She also describes the emotional and social consequences. She lays out the facts about the plague and the effects it had on the world as well as individual families and people. Tuchman also points out victims that belonged to the upper class during that time such as Queen Jeanne and historian Giovanni Villanni (296-297). In this she shows how the plague killed people of all kinds to distress the brutality of the plague.
Families abandoned families and therefore the home’s unity was corrupted. Why could national and local institutions not adequately handle the crisis? No one understood the disease. They thought it spread through un-pure air, but that was an uninvestigated hunch. The victims, cities, and doctors also had inadequate knowledge of the human body, how it worked, and how the plague itself spread and worked.
Plagues and Peoples. By William H. McNeill. (New York: Anchor Books: A division of Random House, Inc., 1976 and Preface 1998. Pp. 7 + 365. Acknowledgements, preface, map, appendix, notes, index.)
The outbreak of foodborne diseases influenced the nation to become concerned of germs in the presence of their cooking. Scientists during the late 19th century insisted that the mothers’ cooking did not do an adequate job of killing the bacterial microbes that were, in turn, killing the community. This belief of the scientists spread throughout America and resulted in a majority of people purchasing their bread from factories instead of homemaking it. However, germ suspicion continued to occur and America began to inspect the bakeries to ensure that they met healthy standards. Upon inspection, many of the committee members on the New York State Factory Investigating Committee believed that the real problem was the cleanliness of immigrant workers. For instance, “The city health commissioner, Ernest Lederle, argue...
It cannot be argued that the Black Plague was detrimental to every aspect of Europe’s communities. It was a powerful epidemic that wiped out a third of the continent’s population. Out of the midst of all its terror, however, positive after effects presented themselves. Some of these effects included revolutions in the church and society, eventually leading to the separation of church and state. Feudalism was also challenged as peasants demanded wages and revolted. Along with social changes came technological innovations, new inventions, and an attention to hygiene and the beginning of modern medicine. The plague may have devastated Europe, but it also gave way to a new era.
Slack, Paul. “Responses to Plague in Early Modern Europe: The Implications of Public Health.” Social Research 55.3 (1988):433-453. Academic Journal. Web. 2 Dec. 2013.
Furman, Bess. A Profile of the United States Public Health Service 1798-1948. District of Columbia: National Institutes of Health, 1973. Print.
The contributions of several doctors, researchers, and scientists helped improve the health of the growing population. In 1850 the average life expectancy was 42 years. By 1910 the average life expectancy had risen to nearly 55 years. Between 1850 and 1910 there were several advances in the medical field. The introduction of genes, white blood cells, blood groups, insulin, rubber gloves, aspirin, and vitamins and the discoveries of Pasteur, Charcot, Halsted, Zirm, Lister, and Koch were the starting point of an international fight against disease.
...e gap in attitudes between pre-medicalized and modern time periods. The trends of technological advancement and human understanding project a completely medicalized future in which medical authorities cement their place above an intently obedient society.
The Black Death plagues had disastrous consequences for Europe in the 14th century. After the initial outbreak in Europe, 1347, it continued for around five years and then mysteriously disappeared. However it broke out again in the 1360s and every few decades thereafter till around 1700. The European epidemic was an outbreak of the bubonic plague, which began in Asia and spread across trade routes. When it reached Europe, a path of destruction began to emerge. Medieval society was tossed into disarray, economies were fractured, the face of culture and religion changed forever. However the plagues devastation was not all chaotic, there were benefits too, such as modern labour movements, improvements in medicine and a new outlook on life. Therefore in order to analyse the impact the Black Death had on societies in the 14th century, this essay will consider the social, economic, cultural and religious factors in order to reach an overall conclusion.
Hence there has been some form of state-funded provision of health and social care in England prior to the NHS for 400 years. However, the fundamental roots of the National Health Service can be traced back to the nineteen century, when legislation from the 1848 Public health act tackled poor sanitation and living conditions. In the early twentieth century the state health service began to develop more systematically. Inspired by the findings of those recruited to fight in the Boer war who were found to be unfit. In 1919 the Ministry of Health was established, when national insurance for sickness was developed. Free access to GPs was provided for certain groups of workers, by the 1940s some 21million, half the population, were covered and two-thirds of GPs were participating in the scheme (Ham 2009). In the nineteenth century institutional provision for sickness had been dominated by the Poor Law workhouses and infirmaries, by 1929 these were transferred to local authorities(LAS) to be developed into a local hospital service, alongside the commercial and voluntary hospitals that had also grown by then, and for the mental ill which had developed since the 1800s. Attaining healthcare service in Britain in the 1930s and 1940s was difficult, life expectancy was very low and thousands of people died of infectious diseases like pneumonia, tuberculosis, polio, meningitis and diphtheria each year. The poor never had access to medical treatment and they relied on Doctors who gave their service free, the hospitals charged for treatment and although the poor where reimbursed, but before they received treatment they had to pay. In the 1930s a series of reports, including studies by the British Medical Association, the collective voice of GPs and hospital
In some way, public health is seen as a modern philosophical and ideological perspective based on ‘equity’ and aimed to determine inequitable in society. It seen as a ‘science’ and ‘art’ in the sense that it deals with the cause of disease, treatment of illness as well as it involves laboratory experiments, intervention and promoting of health of the population. Winslow (1920, p. 23) defined public health as ‘the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting physical health and efficiency through organised community efforts for the sanitation of the environment, the control community infections, the education of the individual in principles of personal hygiene, the organisation of medical and nursing service for early diagnosis and preventive treatment of disease, and the development of social machinery which will ensure to every individual in the community a standard of living adequate for the maintenance of health. On the other hand, it is ‘the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through organised effort of society’ (Acheson, 1998; in Cowley S, 2002, p. 261).
Technological advancement has often outperformed scientific knowledge associated with the causes that determine health. Increasing complications in social organization increase the possibilities by which multiple agents can disturb health, including factors such as those that risk physical health like venomous chemicals or radiation, restricted access to sanitary and pure natural resources, and the infinite amalgamation of them all. Decisions taken in areas apparently detached from health frequently have the prospect to have an impact on people’s health in either positive or negative manner due to a large number of links and connections in modern life. Health is an area comprised of highly intricate systems, which can be accidentally disturbed in unpredictable ways and end up in adverse health concerns that may be serious and irrevocable.