P ublic H ealth
PAST & PRESENT
By David Heaton Managing Editor SWUPHD Public Information Officer The Poison Pump In 1831, England was hit for the first time by a wave of cholera, one of the most dreaded diseases of the time. A bacterial infection of the intestines, cholera causes profuse diarrhea and vomiting and has up to a 60% mortality rate if left untreated, sometimes causing death within hours after symptoms begin. Cholera killed millions of people in the 1800s as it spread from India to Russia, Europe, and North America. Most medical practitioners at the time believed that diseases like cholera spread through a poisonous mist in the air called "miasma". John Snow, a British physician, was skeptical of this theory and challenged it in an 1849 essay. A few years later, London was in the grip of another series of cholera outbreaks. On August 31, 1854 the worst outbreak hit the Soho district, causing most residents to flee
and killing over 600 people over the course of a few weeks. With the aid of a local reverend, Dr. Snow took to the streets of Soho as the outbreak raged in an effort to track down the source. Going door to door to identify where the victims lived and what they had in common, he created a map that helped him narrow his search to a specific area surrounding a water pump on Broad Street. Dr. Snow wrote: "On proceeding to the spot, I found that nearly all the deaths had taken place within a short distance of the 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 that of the pumps which were nearer. In three other cases the deceased were children who went
HEALTH MAGAZINE | WINTER 2022
