The Ghost Map by Steven Johnson gives an in depth account of how a disease can cause immense repercussions in the evolution of society. This story takes place in London in 1854 when there was an enormous outbreak of the disease known as Cholera. Cholera is a disease that wreaks havoc on the body causing deathly dehydration via loss of bodily fluids. This is not just the story of an outbreak. However it discusses many higher order-thinking points in regards to humans and city life. The author Steven Johnson uses this tale as a means to express some important societal lessons. There are a few main ideas that can be taken away from The Ghost Map; the first of which is that sanitation is immeasurably important in society. Another is that society
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Much of the discussion on sanitation is in regards to the abysmal system of sewage in London at the time. Johnson discusses the symbiotic relationship between organisms and waste. Coral produces waste that in turn feeds algae and enables coral reef systems to be the “cities of the sea.”(7) 1 This metaphor is used to emphasize the point that it can be handled in the natural world. Yet overcrowding such as in London 1854 produces many problems. The overcrowding caused an excess amount of waste. This waste needed to be disposed of but was in so large a quantity it posed problems. The waste needed to be taken care of but only desolate people would subject themselves to this disgusting act of labor. Yet even though it was horrible the laborers were paid handsomely. They were paid so well in fact that people would rather let the waste accumulate rather than pay for its removal. This was exacerbated all the more so with the arrival of the water closet. This innovative invention would increase the output of water in London per household by over 30%. It seems like this is an arbitrary statistic but it multiplies the amount of waste in the cesspools by a considerable margin. The idea of sanitation is vital to this story because with it the situation would not have happened. The solution for the problem is clean water and that is exactly what adequate sanitation measures would
Much of the discussion on sanitation is in regards to the abysmal system of sewage in London at the time. Johnson discusses the symbiotic relationship between organisms and waste. Coral produces waste that in turn feeds algae and enables coral reef systems to be the “cities of the sea.”(7) 1 This metaphor is used to emphasize the point that it can be handled in the natural world. Yet overcrowding such as in London 1854 produces many problems. The overcrowding caused an excess amount of waste. This waste needed to be disposed of but was in so large a quantity it posed problems. The waste needed to be taken care of but only desolate people would subject themselves to this disgusting act of labor. Yet even though it was horrible the laborers were paid handsomely. They were paid so well in fact that people would rather let the waste accumulate rather than pay for its removal. This was exacerbated all the more so with the arrival of the water closet. This innovative invention would increase the output of water in London per household by over 30%. It seems like this is an arbitrary statistic but it multiplies the amount of waste in the cesspools by a considerable margin. The idea of sanitation is vital to this story because with it the situation would not have happened. The solution for the problem is clean water and that is exactly what adequate sanitation measures would