London, Being The Densest Settlement On The Planet With 2.5 Million People Into 30 Square Miles

In the summer of 1854, London was coming out as one of the most modern cities in the world. With nearly 2.4 million people living in the area at the time, the city’s infrastructure itself was having a hard time providing for the basic needs of its residents. The biggest problem existing within the city at that time was its waste removal system, or for better terms, its lack of one. Human waste was piling up everywhere, from people houses to the rivers and drinking water. This situation was the perfect breeding conditions for a number of diseases, and towards the end of that summer, one of the most deadly of them all took over. It took the work of both a physician and a local minister in order to discover the mysterious cause of the

John Snow born on the 15th March 1813 – 16th June 1858 grew up in the poorest region of York and subsequently specialised his life establishing the link between the cholera infection he had first encountered in 1831 in Newcastle and water as its vector. Snow’s most famous attribute was his research relating to the cholera outbreak in the London Epidemic of 1854. ‘On proceeding to the spot, I found that nearly all the deaths had taken place within a short distance of the [Broad Street] pump. There were only ten deaths in houses situated decidedly nearer to another street-pump. In five of these cases the families of the deceased persons informed me that they always sent to the pump in Broad Street, as they preferred the water to

Mr. Gawande starts his literature on washing hands. He introduces two friends a microbiologist and an infectious disease specialist. Both work hard and diligently against the spread of diseases just like Semmelweis who is mentioned in the chapter. Something I learned, that not many realize, is that each year two million people acquire an infection while they are in the hospital. Mainly because the clinicians only wash their hands one-third to one-half as many times as they should. Semmelweis, mentioned earlier, concluded in 1847 that doctors themselves were to blame for childbed fever, which was the leading cause of

epidemics to childhood ills." (6) It was in this form that diseases were carried to

The Ghost Map talks of cesspools that the night-soil men would remove from their shift of midnight and four a.m. Without functioning sewage systems the breakthrough of having a water closet created a problem of having more sewage overflow the cesspools. If the overflowing cesspools were replaced with a functioning sewage system there is a great chance that the epidemic could have been prevented. The construction of a sewage system would require a great deal of engineering effort but that shouldn’t have been a problem for London. The sewer systems represented a step in the right direction for the world towards higher standards of cleanliness and sanitation. Steven Johnson focuses his attention on sewer systems because it was a sign of modern technology and the modern world coming alive in the Victorian era. The cholera epidemic also brought a rise to modern medicine. The newspapers provided a type of forum for doctors, nurses, public health authorities, and armchair chemists to share their own as well as read each other's discoveries. Thanks to the forums in the newspapers, patent medical manufacturers began advertising their product in the newspapers making it easier to get a general idea of what could be wrong with you. Advertising was the foot in the door that was needed to begin paving the way for modern medicine. The theme of epidemiology was brought to the surface when John Snow

The purpose of this article is to inform the reader about the case. It informs the reader about the specific case as well as providing information about previous cases of the plague in the area and in the U.S.

That was the time where the newspapers started writing that cholera is coming back on the South side. People started panicking, it was a disaster. The area where the disease occurred, especially the 40 Board Street, became empty, sometimes you could see people going to get water, but that was pretty much it. People who heard about the spreading disease were afraid and most of the families either packed up and left, or they barricaded themselves in their houses. The disease was spreading really fast, and it took so many lives it seemed like eve more than in other outbreaks of cholera. The physician dr. Snow was the one who was called to people who had the cholera symptoms, first it was the Lewis baby, and so on. He was really good educated doctor, an anesthesiologist who had done pioneer work on the application of ether and chloroform to minimalize the pain of surgeries, and he did it well. Queen Victoria was one of the first patients who used chloroform for the birth of her eight child. After she got the medicine she had been so calm and she had less pain. Later on she was appreciated that she could get it. More and more people started catching the disease, and doctor Snow wanted to know why, and what is going on, because after his long studying, reading and looking for information about

Introduction In medieval times, illnesses were a common problem associated with everyday life. However, with the condition of the public hygiene, the lack of medical knowledge, and the quality of the medicines as it were, it is not surprising that the circumstances surrounding illnesses were drastically different from the modern age. People got heavily sick from the lightest of colds, and for some people, it was a matter of life and death.

As we go further in the book, Dr. Snow informs us that the disease is communicated from sick to the healthy by the means of some material (15). The material then confines itself in the alimentary canal and multiplies itself within the systems of the host body (10). His research shows that this material is present in the contaminated water and people are drinking it accidently and acquiring the disease. Further, regarding to Dr. O’Shaughnessy, Dr. Garrod, and Dr. Parkes, Dr. Snow explains that great amount of water is lost from the blood and body; the loss is hardly replaced (11). The loss of water from the blood gives the blood thick tarry appearance, slowing down the blood flow. In addition, the volume of the blood in the body decreases, causing lack of blood supply to different organs of the body (12).Through this, he explains how death is caused by the disease.

In 1854 the city London was the most populated in the world. In just ninety square miles there was over two million currently living there. During this time period having so many people in such a tight place was unknown. With the constant population growth it caused a number of problems. The main problem that was faced was the mass amount of waste and where to put it. Families used water closets, but even with the water closets their waste was emptied into cesspools. It wasn’t uncommon for these cesspools to over fill often, even with night- soil men continuously emptying them. The streets of London were fifthly. With the constant mass amounts of waste the London government came to a decision to dump of the

The liquid from the toilets and the waste heaps seeped down into the earth and contaminated the water supplies. These liquids carried disease-causing germs into the water. The most frightening disease of all was cholera.” (Urban). The lack of sanitation in the water supplies allowed cholera move quickly throughout cities, eventually leading to more than 10,000 deaths in less than three months (Effects).

Typhoid permeated through the streets of London in the nineteenth century due to the citizens’ poor sanitation habits and living conditions. The efforts of generating inventive measures by public health authorities went unnoticed by many citizens. The sanitary habits of the people were extremely frustrating and challenge for officials. The stress compiled as public sanitation officers and health officials became overwhelmed due to the nature and volume of the living standards. In order to regain control over the sanitation issues the public would need to follow the requirements that officials set before them. Moreover, the concern calls for the public’s attention and cooperation of the plan that will solve the Victorian city’s largest issue.

At the same time, Britain became more industrialized, towns started to grow and became over populated especially factory towns. Houses in these factory towns were close together, and because of this the living conditions in these houses were overcrowded, damp and dirty. People ate, slept and cooked in the same places. There were no sewers so there was human waste everywhere, because of the

In the 1850s over 400,000 tonnes of waste and sewage was being discharged into the River Thames each day. By 1858 the stench from the raw sewage around and within the Thames was named the ‘Great Stink’. It was a Civil Engineer named Joseph Bazalgette who proposed a plan of the creation of an underground network of tunnels, to put an end to the polluted river. His engineering feat has been improved and extended vastly but the Victorian Sewers still stand as London’s primary sewer system. The sewers were designed to be a combined system meaning rainwater and waste were transported in the same manner. Bazalgette designed Combined Sewage Overflow (CSO) points along the Thames. The CSO’s discharged the sewage and rainwater into the Thames after substantial rainfall, this prevented flooding the streets and houses. When designing the sewers, population increase was taken into consideration. (16) The underground system and factories were designed to treat and transfer sewage of up to double the population that was present when construction began. However the population of London almost quadrupled from 2.35 Million in 1850 (19) to 8.17 million in 2011(7). This drastic increase meant that the sewers were overloaded. The CSO’s were overflowing with only 2mm of rainfall and on average discharging into the Thames around twice a week. The head of Thames Water Phil stride, said “Currently, 32 million cubic metres of storm sewage overflows from London 's Victorian sewers into

Time and time again, throughout history, typhus reappears when society is in distress. From war to famine to natural disaster, when the social order collapses, typhus is the result. This paper will explore the cause of typhus, treatment, and how typhus has impacted the course of history.