From:
In 1892, the ruling class of Hamburg ignored scientists and delayed their response to the city’s cholera outbreak by weeks out of concern for the economy.
“The doctors were slow in winning the confidence of the ruling classes in Hamburg, who were suspicious of their claim to a monopoly in the health market and their attempt to strengthen hygienic and sanitary regulations,” wrote Gordan A. Craig in his piece Politics of a Plague, first published in our June 30th, 1988 issue.
We've unlocked the essay in full through the end of April.
“Typical of the disregard of medical advice is the fact that decades after the introduction of compulsory vaccination against smallpox in the rest of Germany, Hamburg’s government continued to rely on voluntary methods of prevention, and when the medical profession pressed for legislation on the subject in the 1860s, and again in 1871, this was rejected by the Citizens’ Assembly, with the argument on the latter occasion that compulsory vaccination 'encroaches upon personal freedom and liberty, and upon the most basic right of the individual, that of the freedom to dispose of his body as he wishes.' Later in the year, soldiers returning from the war against France brought the smallpox virus with them.”
More from our archives...
Tony Judt: On ‘The Plague’
Susan Sontag: Disease as Political Metaphor
Hilton Als: Ghosts in Sunlight
Gore Vidal: On Rereading the Oz Books
Hilary Mantel: The Perils of Antoinette
Gini Alhadeff: Moving Targets
Tony Judt: On ‘The Plague’
Susan Sontag: Disease as Political Metaphor
Hilton Als: Ghosts in Sunlight
Gore Vidal: On Rereading the Oz Books
Hilary Mantel: The Perils of Antoinette
Gini Alhadeff: Moving Targets
You are receiving this message because you signed up for email newsletters from The New York Review.
No comments:
Post a Comment