Tuberculosis in the Victorian Era
Tuberculosis has been one of the most fatal diseases since the beginning of history. However, it was especially dangerous during the Victorian Era. All Victorians experienced the distress of tuberculosis in some way, making it a tremendous problem for society at the time. The eternal search for an effective, absolute cure of this dreaded disease has lasted for centuries, from the Ancient Egyptians on the Nile, to modern times. Nevertheless, several crucial leaps were made in the medical field during the Victorian Era that helped to curb the toll of tuberculosis on society.
Tuberculosis is a potentially lethal, contagious disease, mainly caused by a bacterium known as Mycobacterium tuberculosis, or Mtb. This
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Tuberculosis is spread from person to person through droplet infection. In other words, when an active victim coughs, they eject millions of tiny infected aerosol droplets of sputum into the air, and when another person breathes in the Mtb, the bacteria nestle in the lungs, make themselves at home, and immediately begin multiplying. Despite this, tuberculosis does not live long under exposure to the sun, and can only hang in the air for around four hours before it dies (Breslin). Also, tuberculosis does not spread through contact with a patient’s body, their personal belongings, sharing food or drink, and even kissing (How). Consequently, contrary to popular belief, tuberculosis is not as highly contagious as compared to other infectious diseases. Since exposure to contaminated air and prolonged proximity with tuberculosis patients dramatically increases the likelihood of infection, around one in three close contacts, mainly immediate family and intimate friends, and one in ten remote contacts of an infected individual thus became infected as well (Tuberculosis). This nature of tuberculosis often caused tragedies in households, killing off entire families at a time, since the most frequent visitors were relatives. The most famous example of an entire generation of a bloodline being completely wiped out by tuberculosis was the Bronte sisters. These …show more content…
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Several great scientists and doctors discovered a myriad of new cures and technologies to correlate with the prevention of sickness and disease. The practice of medicine also has become more advanced and reliable. One of the most prominent inventions during this time was the invention of the iron lung. The iron lung was created by Philip Drinker in 1928 and caused many lives to be saved. The machine works by having a patient lie within a chamber and pulls air in and out of the lungs.
The video highlighted the cramped living conditions, crowded school and buses. If people with early signs of infection are delaying treatment then they could easily transmit the disease in cramped quarters, since the disease is airborne. Nakubheka acquired the MDR-TB from her mother, either while she was still living at home or during the times she visited her
These factors helped reduce the cases of infectious diseases like typhoid, tuberculosis and pneumonia. Out of this one accomplishment of Wald’s has
Eventually this man theorized that disease is an imbalance of natural activities and that a fever was the bodies attempt to keep from dying. Boerhaave suggested that digestion and circulation could be explained by mechanical ideas and that three conditions led to disease: salty, putrid, and oily conditions in the body. He said in order to fix this you have to sweeten the acid, purify the stomach and rid impurities through bleeding and purging. Although his theories are still used today, the others really did nothing to shape societies medical knowledge. Unlike the colonists, the people of the Civil War era not only helped influence medicine but helped influence America and its people.
The majority of the people who died from this epidemic lived in congested housing like tenements. Tuberculosis was also very popular in tenements. Doctors credited eight to
The Civil war physicians that studied gangrene lesion used the microscope which revealed dead tissue blood vessels in the area occluded with “stagnant blood” and these microscopic organisms they observed was a result of infection. According to Adams “the gangrene patient might see a black spot the size of a dime, appear on his healing wound, and watch with horrified interest its rapid spread until his whole leg or arm was but a rotten, evil-smelling mass of dead flesh” Even though they did not establish bacteriology the physicians understood that the disease was destructive. This led to studies of the disease and there was a demand for cleanliness and the use of disinfectants in hospitals. This demonstrates a positive impact of the Civil War on medicine because physicians
There were not a lot of advancements made, as said in the article “Medicine in the Civil War.” During the 1860’s, doctors had yet developed bacteriology and were generally ignorant of the causes of disease. In conclusion, diseases in the Civil War impacted the growth of American doctors, types of disease, and medicine. These factors changed
Meanwhile, those sick with tuberculosis had an increased appetite but had no way to satisfy their hunger. This made people see those with cancer as the more fortunate, even though both diseases are terrible. Tuberculosis was also thought to be helped by a change of scenery, by moving from a damp city to a dry place. But cancer could not be helped by changing the environment because it is the body’s cells becoming malignant. Therefore, if cancer would be cured, it would have to be fought inside the body with no help from the environment.
The late 1800s and the early 1900s saw a rise in tuberculosis, a deadly infectious disease that affected a large portion of the population. Tuberculosis was highly contagious and spread quickly through the air, causing significant mortality rates. The disease was especially prevalent in urban areas where overcrowding, poverty, and unsanitary living conditions made it easier to spread. At the time, there were no effective treatments for tuberculosis, and many people believed that the disease was incurable. However, doctors and health officials observed that people who lived in clean, fresh air environments seemed to fare better in their fight against the disease.
In 1793 a fever infected Philadelphia that killed 10% of its population. The book Fever 1793 by Laurie Halse Anderson is a historical fiction from a young girl named Matilda’s perspective. The book is about her experience dealing with the Yellow fever epidemic in Philadelphia. She learned many lessons and one of them was that fear can control you. Some of the reasons fear can control you is how it can make you leave what you know, it can make you turn on people, and it can make you vulnerable.
During the Elizabethan era there were dangerous disease such as the Black Death. The Black Death was killing half of the population. Another disease that was dangerous was Anemia. “Elizabethan era failed to give a high standard of health; people are plagued by various diseases and ailments.” (Alchin)
1.)The Black Plague has struck. It is a curse from God for all of us sinners. We must have done something awful to deserve something so horrible. The Black Plague is a sickness that kills you only a few days after you get it.
Does one ever have a reduced ability to concentrate, excessive fears, and extreme mood changes? Signs of disorders and mental illness are shown through these causes and told all around us. Movies, books, TV shows, in one's own life, or other's lives. In the romance novel, Jane Eyre the Bronte sisters demonstrate this through fiction and the fictional characters' thoughts and feelings. Even though this book is taken as fiction there is an extremely strong sense of
“diseases such as tuberculosis...asthma...heart conditions...trench foot...” (Brought To Life:
Emily Brontë approaches the idea of sickness and death of the characters in her novel Wuthering Heights in a peculiar way. The characters that are ill are usually mentally ill, and their deaths often result from physical ailments derived from mental illness. The drive for revenge and desire for love that reigns among the characters often lands them in stressful situations that cause them to spiral downward into these mental illnesses. Emily Brontë’s emphasis on the motif of sickness and death in Wuthering Height deepens the drama of the plot and constructs more complicated relationships between the characters.