Tag Archives: John Snow

Epidemic cholera and Joseph William Bazalgette

December 22, 2021

JMS Pearce Hull, England, United Kingdom     Fig 1. Joseph Bazalgette. Photo by Lock & Whitfield. 1877. National Portrait Gallery London. Via Wikimedia Rampant epidemics of cholera took many lives in the Victorian era. These epidemics were finally overcome with the discovery that cholera was a waterborne infection and by massive reconstruction of the […]

Peter Panum and the “geography of disease”

August 18, 2021

Kathryne Dycus Madrid, Spain   Peter Panum. Scan from P. Hansens “Illustreret Dansk Litteraturhistorie”, anden meget forøgede udgave, 2. bind, 1902. Public Domain. Via Wikimedia. In 1846, the Faroe Islands experienced an outbreak of measles, the likes of which had not been seen in sixty-five years. The Danish government called upon a newly graduated physician, […]

The dream of the uterus

August 10, 2020

F. Gonzalez-Crussi  Chicago, Illinois, United States   Front page of the book that started the debate on “the thinking uterus” at the University of Bologna: Genial days of the dialectic of women, reduced to its true principle, etc. Naples, 1763. More than one-half century ago, it was my duty to examine and describe, day in […]

Health, wellness, and their determinants

January 28, 2020

Travis Kirkwood Ottawa, Ontario, Canada   Original map made by John Snow in 1854. Cholera cases are highlighted in black. 2nd Ed by John Snow. Public Domain due to age. John Snow is often referred to as the father of modern epidemiology. His work is certainly worthy of this1 and present-day public health2 still strives toward […]

Patients and society: The big divide

January 27, 2017

J.M.S. Pearce United Kingdom   But society has now fairly got the better of individuality; and the danger which threatens human nature, is not the excess, but the deficiency, of personal impulses and preferences. John Stuart Mill (1806–1873), On Liberty, chapter 3, 1859      John Snow memorial and pub. Photo by Justinc on Wikimedia. […]