The Filth Disease: Typhoid Fever and the Practices of Epidemiology in Victorian England

Author:   Dr Jacob Steere-Williams (Royalty Account)
Publisher:   Boydell & Brewer Ltd
ISBN:  

9781648250026


Pages:   340
Publication Date:   15 November 2020
Format:   Hardback
Availability:   In Print   Availability explained
This item will be ordered in for you from one of our suppliers. Upon receipt, we will promptly dispatch it out to you. For in store availability, please contact us.

Our Price $343.20 Quantity:  
Add to Cart

Share |

The Filth Disease: Typhoid Fever and the Practices of Epidemiology in Victorian England


Add your own review!

Overview

Shows how the investigation of local outbreaks of typhoid fever in Victorian Britain led to the emergence of the modern discipline of epidemiology as the leading science of public health Typhoid fever is a food- and water-borne infectious disease that was insidious and omnipresent in Victorian Britain. It was one of the most prolific diseases of the Industrial Revolution. There was a palpable public anxiety aboutthe disease in the Victorian era, no doubt fueled by media coverage of major outbreaks across the nation, but also because Queen Victoria's husband, Prince Albert, died of the disease in 1861. Their son and heir, Prince Albert Edward, contracted and nearly succumbed to typhoid a decade later in 1871. The Filth Disease shows that typhoid was at the center of a number of critical debates about health, science, and governance. Victorian public health reformers, the book argues, working in central and local government, framed typhoid as the most pressing public health problem in order to persuade local officials to implement sanitary infrastructure to prevent the spread of disease. In this period British epidemiologists uncovered how typhoid is spread via food and water supplies, disrupting the longstanding idea that typhoid was spread via filth. In the process the modern disciple of epidemiology emerged as the chief science of public health. Typhoid was as much a social and political problem as it was a scientific one, and The Filth Disease provides a striking reminder of the cultural context in which infectious diseases strike populations and how scientists study them.

Full Product Details

Author:   Dr Jacob Steere-Williams (Royalty Account)
Publisher:   Boydell & Brewer Ltd
Imprint:   University of Rochester Press
Dimensions:   Width: 15.20cm , Height: 2.30cm , Length: 22.90cm
Weight:   0.001kg
ISBN:  

9781648250026


ISBN 10:   1648250025
Pages:   340
Publication Date:   15 November 2020
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional and scholarly ,  General/trade ,  Professional & Vocational ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print   Availability explained
This item will be ordered in for you from one of our suppliers. Upon receipt, we will promptly dispatch it out to you. For in store availability, please contact us.

Table of Contents

Typhoid Cultures and Framing the Filth Disease A Royal Thanksgiving: Disease and the Victorian Social Body A Good Working Theory: Water and the Methods of Outbreak Investigation before 1880 Nature's Not-So Perfect Food: The Epidemiology of Milk-Borne Typhoid Soils, Stools, and Saprophytes: Epidemiology in the Age of Bacteriology Typhoid in the Tropics: Imperial Bodies, Warfare, and the Reframing of Typhoid as a Global Disease The Afterlife of Victorian Typhoid

Reviews

Offers a careful and detailed discussion of typhoid and epidemiology from the late 1860s to 1901. Steere-Williams tells an important story of how epidemiologists came to claim and define a field of knowledge and authority to speak for the public good. * VICTORIAN STUDIES * A nuanced case study of developing chains of evidence, hallmarks of outbreak investigation, and rhetorical performances of Victorian epidemiology... Should be required reading for historians of public health and epidemiology. * JOURNAL OF BRITISH STUDIES *


Author Information

JACOB STEERE-WILLIAMS is an Associate professor of history at the College of Charleston. He received his Ph.D. in history from the University of Minnesota in 2011.

Tab Content 6

Author Website:  

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

No review item found!

Add your own review!

Countries Available

All regions
Latest Reading Guide

Aorrng

Shopping Cart
Your cart is empty
Shopping cart
Mailing List