Cholera Epidemic

• Cholera originated in India and was brought back aboard trading ships entering British ports from the Empire
• Cholera was often fatal and provided a very undignified and painful death
• Symptoms of Cholera

  • Severe, explosive diarrhea
  • Vomiting
  • Dehydration
  • Agonizing cramps
  • Painful joints
  • Shrunken and pale faces
  • Coma
  • Death
• Cholera usually killed in a matter of days, occasionally in hours
• Cholera outbreaks affected many cities including Newcastle, Exeter, Liverpool, and London
• Cholera was caused by sewage getting into drinking water, not by bad smells or miasma
• Cholera statistics for 19th-century epidemics

  • 1831-32: Approximately 32,000 deaths, 6,536 in London
  • 1848: 62,000 deaths nationally, 14,137 in London
  • 1853-54: Around 20,000 deaths, majority in London
  • Next epidemic: 14,000 deaths, around a third in London
• Edward Chadwick: 'They merely pass dirty linen or cloth through very dirty water. The smell of the linen itself when so washed is very offensive and must have injurious or bad effect upon the health of the occupants. The filth of their dwellings is offensive and so is their personal filth.'
• Cholera outbreaks began to change in 1854 with the Broad Street cholera epidemic


  Attitudes towards the cause of cholera began to shift
• John Snow's theory on Cholera


  Most deaths were occurring around a specific pump, not near other nearby pumps. He theorized that the contaminated water from the specific pump was the cause of the disease
• Dr. Jon Snow's method in solving cholera


  Identifying the cause by mapping cholera deaths around the Broad Street pump, interviewing local people, and noticing anomalies like the Brewery workers surviving due to drinking boiled beer
• Dr. Jon Snow was the first to correctly identify that cholera was caused by Dirty Water in 1854
• Dr. Jon Snow noticed a deadly cholera outbreak centered on the Broad Street pump in London
• People who drank water from the Broad Street pump often became ill and died
• Workers of a nearby Brewery who only drank the beer survived the cholera outbreak
• Dr. Jon Snow demonstrated his findings on a map marking where cholera deaths occurred
• Dr. Jon Snow personally removed the handle from the Broad Street pump to stop the outbreak
• An underground cesspit full of sewage was leaking into the pump causing the cholera outbreak
• Louis Pasteur's germ Theory later demonstrated why Dr. Jon Snow's idea was correct
• Dr. Jon Snow was unfortunately unable to convince the people in power of his findings during his lifetime
• Louis Pasteur proved that bacteria and germs in water could cause beer and wine to go bad in the 1860s
• Louis Pasteur and others put forward the germ Theory stating that bacteria in water was a cause of disease
• People now believe that cholera was a disease from dirty water
• Dr. Jon Snow died before his ideas were accepted
• Edwin Chadwick, a politician, changed his mind about government interference after investigating the living conditions of the poor in 1842
• Edwin Chadwick argued that disease was caused or made worse by filth and dirt in poor living conditions
• Edwin Chadwick argued that poor people lived in terribly overcrowded and poor quality houses leading to disease
• Edwin Chadwick wrote a report called the sanitary conditions of the laboring population
• Chadwick argued that disease was caused or made worse by filth and dirt
• Chadwick argued that poor people lived in terribly overcrowded and poor quality houses
• Chadwick believed in the miasma Theory
• Chadwick believed that you could recommend people to change things for health reasons but not force them
• Joseph Bazalgette was an amazing engineer
• London owes Joseph Bazalgette a great debt of gratitude for his work after the great stink of 1858
• The Metropolitan Board of Works commissioned Joseph Bazalgette to build a brand new sewer system after the great stink of 1858
• Joseph Bazalgette's sewers were mostly completed by 1865
• Joseph Bazalgette's sewers kept the sewage away from the drinking water, preventing cholera from returning
• Joseph Bazalgette's sewers helped clean up the water and stopped the cholera outbreaks
• The last London cholera outbreak was declared over by the end of 1866
• Dr. John Snow proved that cholera was carried in the water


  1854