Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Quarantine

  • Ship fever: A malignant disease of a most dangerous kind?

    Richard de GrijsSydney, Australia During the Age of Sail, “road,” “workhouse,” “hospital,” “army,” “camp,” “emigrant,” “jail”/“gaol,” and “ship” were routine noun adjuncts pertaining to the deadly fevers frequently occurring in overcrowded spaces in cold weather. Although “fever” diagnoses were common, most such instances in ships’ surgeons’ journals related to typhus or typhoid fevers—until 1869, they…

  • The history of quarantine and contact tracing as surveillance strategies

    Mariella ScerriVictor GrechMalta Quarantine, from the Italian quaranta, meaning forty, is a centuries-old public health measure instituted to control the spread of infectious diseases by mandating isolation, sanitary cordons, and other mitigation measures.1 Though essential in preventing the spread of disease, such measures have often been controversial, as they raised “political, ethical, and socioeconomic issues…

  • Lucid interval

    Emma ManuelEshwar RajeshChennai, India Even during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, some people like me were silently grateful for the opportunity to spend some time with their family. Born as a single child whose parents got frequent transfers, I had lived with my grandparents to get proper schooling, and then some twenty years passed…

  • Hope quarantined

    Prasad IyerSingapore Poet’s statement This fictional poem expresses the feelings of a migrant separated from his family during the COVID pandemic. Hope quarantined Quarantine forceth divorced soulsDistanced families and broken wholesShards of thoughts, impaling my core Locked down borders’ hearts a sore Shallow slumber, uneasy sense Worries, anxieties common hence.  Weeks and months in the twilight zoneTogether in…

  • Locked down!

    P. Ravi ShankarKuala Lumpur, Malaysia The sun was about to rise on another day of lockdown. At the beginning of a new day there is a vague sense of optimism, but that is followed by an overwhelming sense of tiredness, ennui, and crushed hopes at the thought of being confined within our apartment. My brother…

  • Dr. Samuel Sarphati

    Annabelle SlingerlandLeiden, the Netherlands Times of confusion and uncertainty can also be fruitful grounds for seeds to root, rise, and bloom. One such seed was Dr. Samuel Sarphati, who created New Amsterdam on the banks of the river Amstel. Amsterdam in the early nineteenth century was already renowned for its prosperous canal belts, streets lit…

  • How a small town kept smallpox small

    Annabelle SlingerlandLeiden, the Netherlands To make a mountain out of a molehill is a vice, but to keep the mole underground is a virtue. The little town of Tilburg in the south of the Netherlands was not accustomed to seeing mountains, but when a molehill first came into sight, it promptly flattened it into the…

  • Sidelined

    Katherine WhiteRockville, Maryland, United States From the safety of my home, I watch the unfolding of the slow-motion car wreck that is the COVID-19 pandemic. Retired from the practice of neonatal medicine for over eight years, my medical license has been inactive for half that time. In my state of Maryland, the web page for…

  • A plastic surgeon’s weeks in lockdown

    Neha ChauhanBangalore, Karnataka, India As I tuned in to the announcement on March 24th, 2020 that India would be completely locked down for next three weeks to flatten the curve of coronavirus spread, my heart skipped a beat and then almost sank. I spent a sleepless night trying to understand my reaction of experiencing a…

  • Plagues and prejudice

    Anne JacobsonOak Park, Illinois, United States It was a calm, clear January morning on the gritty streets of paradise. Honolulu, the capital of the newly-annexed U.S. territory of Hawaii, was ushering out a century of upheaval that had included the arrival of explorers, missionaries, and deadly diseases such as smallpox and measles; the overthrow of…