History of Medecine, 19th - 20th century summary

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Fighting Disease

Jenner

  • Edward Jenner – 1796 – tested vaccination on James Phipps
  • Opposition:         1. Different to what had been taught previously

2. Doctors in inoculation would lose business (Suffolk’s, over 10,000)

3. Doctor from the country, not a leading doctor/ Some died of cowpox

4. Disease of an animal couldn’t help humans

5. Injecting disease into the body doesn’t make sense

6. Propaganda – James Gillray 1802 cartoon of humans  cows

Opposition was overcome because vaccination worked, was widely publicised and had many supporters, home and abroad.

Pasteur & Koch

  • In 1857, Pasteur was investigating why sugar beet went sour ( a problem in the brewing industry)  1862, Swan neck flask heated.
  • In 1867, he was studying pebrine, a silkworm disease - he was able to demonstrate germs were the cause of it. The link between disease and germs had been made

  • 1870 – Germs, decay and disease were widely accepted – next thing to indentify particular germs
  • 1872, Koch studied anthrax  1875 he had identified the germ that caused it
  • Koch then investigated septicaemia (blood poisoning) – however the cells were too small to see, so he used chemical dyes which aided him in the discovery of it -  and photographed the whole process
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  • When Pasteur heard of his success, he was determined to make more discoveries as France had just embarrassingly lost the Franco-Prussian war in 1870-1
  • 1887 began working on curing anthrax
  • 1880 – work interrupted as he was asked to find a cure to chicken cholera
  • Chamberland responsible for injecting chickens  left it uncovered and went on holiday  on his return injected the chickens but they didn’t die
  • Attenuation – weakened by being exposed to air
  • Used this knowledge and applied it anthrax... heated for eight days to make it weak
  • Pouilly-le- fort, 5th May 1881 Mr ...

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