the 20th century

• a magic bullet is a substance that can target a specific microbe causing an infection and treat it
• the first magic bullet was salvarsan 606 created by dr ehelich to treat syphilis. it kills the infection, but it didn't only target infected cells it also targeted healthy cells, possibly causing death
• prontosil was created by gerald domagk. it could treat blood infections but not all as it could only treat blood infections caused by some bacteria, it couldn't treat staphylocci infections
• alexander fleming:

  • discovered penicillin in 1928
  • when away on holiday he left a pile of petri dishes containing bacteria on his laboratary bench, when he came back he found mould on one of his petri dishes, around the mould the staphylocci had dissapeared
  • didn't have an impact as it didn't work on deep infections and took a long time to create enough pencillin to be used.
  • in 1929 he wrote about it in a medical journal but no one at the time thought it was important
  • long term impact was this was the first antibiotic and this inspired florey and chain
• florey and chain:

  • read fleming's article on penicillin, thought it would be effective so they got funding from the government
  • only got £25 so asked for money from america and got enough for 5 years research
  • discovered pencillin worked on mice so experimented on a man called albert alexander, he started to get better but they couldn't make enough so the penicillin ran out and he died
• DNA:

  • in 1951 a scientist called rosalind franklin took the first photo of DNA called photo 51
  • photo 51 was shown to two scientists, crick and watson, who used the photo to discover the structure of DNA
  • the equipment used to discover DNA was extremely expensive, the money was provided by the government
  • photo 51 was only possible because of x-ray photographs and better microscopes
• impact of discovery of DNA:

  • could find the causes of genetic disease
  • didn't improve treatments yet as gene therapy was still in testing, which was replacing mutated genes that could cause cancer with healthy genes
  • slightly improved prevention as doctors knew what genes would make people more likely to get sick
• lifestyle:

  • in the 19th century there were the first detailed reports about how living conditions affected people's lives
  • discovered being overweight can cause type 2 diabetes, smoking can cause lung cancer
  • improved life expectancy as diseases that are difficult to be treated like cancer could be prevented
• diagnosing disease:

  • invented scans, microscopes and nuclear medecine so they could see diseases and be able to identify and diagnose people
  • doctors could investiage what diseases looked like and causes because of science and technology
• NHS:

  • created because of the war as children from towns were sent to middle-class families who were shocked by their conditions, people felt a sense of togetherness. people wanted a better future so healthcare was important
  • in the beveridge report it was reccommended to set up a free national health service which was paid from taxes, 8 million people hadn't seen a doctor before
• the impact of the NHS:

  • NHS helped improve treatments as treatments were free so more people could access them
  • doctors and nurses got improved equipment and nurses could develop specialist skills such as patients undergoing radiotherapy or chemotherapy
• fighting lung cancer:

  • cases increased cause of smoking, to prevent it the goverment launched campaigns to warn against the dangers of smoking and created laws that made public places like cafes, cinemas, and workplaces smoke free
  • to try to treat it the gov invested large sums of money into improved treatments such as radiotherapy and chemotherapy
  • science + technology improved our ability to treat lung cancer as it gave us tech to diagnose lung cancer + tech to treat it