The Yellow Fever Before The 18th Century

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

Fever 1793 is a historical fiction novel written by Laurie Halse Anderson that describes how Yellow Fever affected lives of everybody during the three months of sickness and panic in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Life today is more straightforward than it was in 1793 because of the technology. Fever 1793 is a story about a young girl, Matilda “Mattie” Cook, who faces challenges surviving in a Yellow Fever- struck city (Philadelphia). Mattie loses her grandfather on her journey of survival and her mother is nowhere to be seen, leaving Mattie to grow up and survive her journey alone. If the story was taking place in modern times, Mattie and the rest of Philadelphia would not struggle as much as they did in the story. The modern day technology that is here today allows this generation to progress through life smoother. Today’s technology would have a significant, positive impact on the community during 1793. If the people of Philadelphia had the knowledge of symptoms and treatments of Yellow Fever, they would have known for sure if the fever was occurring in the beginning and they would have also known how the fever was to

Both Dr. Rush of Philadelphia, and Dr. Devese of France trained in Haiti, were highly trained professionals who treated fever victims of their time. Dr. Rush and Dr. Devese both treated their patients with an extremely cold bath that the water will freeze! As well as the patients will be needed to drink emetics. Emetics are used to

In 1793 Philadelphia suffered from a deadly disease that spread all through the town; it was called yellow fever. The Philadelphia Doctors and the French doctors were attempting to treat yellow fever. The doctors had many ways to try to fix this, but they did not have the technology we do today. Yellow fever occurred 1793. The outbreak happened in Philadelphia. This sad event that killed many people was all because of infected mosquitoes. They came over with the ill refuges. About 2,000 to 5,000 people died. All in all, this was one of the one of the worst things to occur in history

While reading An American Plague, I noticed an interesting detail that Yellow Fever could actually be prevented. Murphy (2003) notes that doctors noted the symptoms of the sick patients from the disease Yellow Fever. Some of the symptoms were pain in the back and painful aching in the body. This detail led me to wonder if there was a way that you could prevent Yellow fever. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that wearing bug repellent will reduce the chances for getting bit by a mosquito and they also talk about having more clothing on your body will also help because then mosquito's can not bite you. The article also talks about vaccines because we know have a yellow fever vaccine and that will cure yellow fever.

Another example from the book is in chapter 2 on page 15 the idea that illness was caused by microscopic organisms, such as bacteria and viruses, was not known at the time. Instead, doctors based their medical thinking on the 2,500-year-old Greek humoral theory. THis concept stated that good health resulted when body fluids, called humors, were balance. This means that you could have the humors. The humors were phlegm, choler, bile, and blood.

All throughout history nations all over the world have dealt with deadly diseases, but one in particular brought out the fear in the nations of Europe, the bubonic plague or as others call it, the black death. During the thirteenth century, medicine was not as developed as it is now, causing England to suffer more than others. According to Cantor (2002) the European nations encountered the bubonic plague in its most brutal state during 1348 to 1349, taking out about a third of Europe’s population (pp. 6-7). He continues on by claiming that one big question to this event was whether or not the plague was the full cause to the loss of lives or if there was another cause along with it (p. 11). Cantor (2002) also explained that the reason the black plague stopped in Europe around the eighteenth century could possibly have been from an introduction to a new species of rats, the gray rat (p. 13). Even though there is controversy based around the plague being spread by rats and how it was stopped by isolation, it may have taught countries useful strategies and ways to grow stronger.

Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, as the country grew and trade flourished, periodic epidemics struck regions of the nation as population density increased. Outbreaks of influenza, cholera took over the nation, and in the south, one of the most prevalent was yellow fever. Due to these diseases, a lot of public health policies were either created or changed to better suit the new issues arising. In this essay, I will argue that the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1878 brought upon many changes in the health realm in terms of public sanitation. In order to prove the epidemic s place in the history of health policies, I will be discussing the creation of the new sewer system, waste disposal techniques, and other projects created.

In Philadelphia, 1793, a disease that haunted and still haunts America to this day was the yellow fever. It was caused by a little but deadly mosquito called aedes. It spread this disease to many people and it killed around 5,000 people per town. It was the most deadly plague in American history. Some say it was like the black plague. I’ll be talking about why it’s called the Yellow Fever, how did it spread, how it got to America, how it affected the capital, about our local area back then, the people who were trying to help fight it, and the first hospital ever built.

The 1878 yellow fever epidemic in Memphis proved to be fatal, killing almost all who got infected. The disease traveled up from New Orleans infecting and killing many on its way. Memphis was going through reconstruction and was becoming the center for merchants and travelers. Furthermore, Memphis began to become overly populated only increasing the devastation that would be caused by the yellow fever. This was a confusing period were even medical professionals did not know where the disease came from or how they could to stop it. The epidemic caused panic and challenged the state government of Tennessee and made changes to it that are still in effect today.

Throughout history many different diseases have infected the world. Such diseases consist of measles, mumps, malaria, typhus and yellow fever. Many of these diseases are caused by different things and originated in different countries.

These rules were essential because they created order and, overall, saved many lives and made Colonial America and Philadelphia a safer place. They did this by writing emphasis on how important cleanliness was, ensuring that each fever victim could obtain medical help in some way, and much more in their rule set. Furthermore, the College of Physicians came up with a theory concerning how the fever started. This theory was that the fever reached Colonial America and Philadelphia through trade ships that might have not only brought merchandise, but also native diseases and disease-carrying rodents (5). Having this theory was necessary because with an idea on how the fever was originally started officials and citizens were able to take extra precautions and prevent the

The Yellow Fever virus came from Central or East Africa. With transmission between primates and humans, the virus has been spread from there to West Africa. The virus was probably brought to the Americas with the slave trade ships from 1492 after the first European exploration. The first case of Yellow fever was recorded in Mexico by Spanish colonists in 1648. Consequently, the virus started to spread also in North America. In Philadelphia in 1793, more than the 9% of the population die. The American government had to escape from the city that was the temporary capital. One of the most famous outbreaks happen in Europe in Barcelona in 1821.How explains the article "The 'plague' of Barcelona. Yellow Fever epidemic of 1821", the outbreak of

Rush’s adoption of Sydenham’s theory is an example of how Americans were struggling to distance themselves from Europe. His theory of the cause of yellow fever mirrored the work of Sydenham. He fell into the pattern of adopting a theory from Europe and not conducting his own observations or experiments. Rush had created some American individualism in his methods of cleaning up the city. However, his use of Sydenham’s theory brought him back to Europeanism.

Treatment would not have been available if not for the scientist who did studies and came up with vaccines. In 1900 Dr. Carlos Finlay did a study that proved that Yellow Fever is spread by mosquitoes. Later in 1930, Max Theiler created a vaccine that controlled the virus. Yellow fever was brought to the Americas on ships due to the slave trade. The first case recorded was located on the Yucatan Peninsula in the 17th century. During the 18th century Yellow Fever was spread to North