Scientific discoveries both from the United States and Europe, during the late-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, heralded a dramatic break between public health services’ control and improvement of society. It was a moment of contradiction that created unmatched medical advancement that was accompanied by intense imperial force abroad. While these two centuries saw the advancement to infectious disease treatment, reform of individual and household hygiene, and collective health practices, it also used these same advancements as justification to control and reshaping European political and economic influence over the world. The same public health campaigns that helped improve the lives of middle class, also created a society of surveillance
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This discovery supported the germ theory of disease and was used as a model to explain the origin and spread of diseases (Tomes 37). This scientific discovery catalyzed collective health policies, such as the sewage system and garbage collection, that the intersected and improved everyday life in western Europe and the United States (Tomes 6). By this time, society in Europe had evolved tremendously from the London plague where people looked to the stars for answers and were not constantly being reminded of death. However, although the intersections of scientific discoveries reformed the individual and house hygiene, this same model was used during peak western imperialism (Tomes 6). Instead of pathologizing a house, western imperial powers began pathologizing whole ethnic classes in foreign …show more content…
This is especially evident with American imperialism and its public health campaigns when it came to controlling the “others” both abroad in the Philippines and at home, in the melting pot that were the tenements of New York City. At the turn of the century the United States embarked on its journey of becoming an imperial power by fighting against the Spanish in the “splendid little war” of 1898. During this time the Philippines were being attacked in more ways than one, for instance, the Spanish and Americans were fighting both each other and small pox (Hays 192). On the other front, Filipinos were fighting for their sovereignty as well as a plague and cholera epidemic. However, since cholera was termed the “filth disease” by public health experts,
This discovery supported the germ theory of disease and was used as a model to explain the origin and spread of diseases (Tomes 37). This scientific discovery catalyzed collective health policies, such as the sewage system and garbage collection, that the intersected and improved everyday life in western Europe and the United States (Tomes 6). By this time, society in Europe had evolved tremendously from the London plague where people looked to the stars for answers and were not constantly being reminded of death. However, although the intersections of scientific discoveries reformed the individual and house hygiene, this same model was used during peak western imperialism (Tomes 6). Instead of pathologizing a house, western imperial powers began pathologizing whole ethnic classes in foreign …show more content…
This is especially evident with American imperialism and its public health campaigns when it came to controlling the “others” both abroad in the Philippines and at home, in the melting pot that were the tenements of New York City. At the turn of the century the United States embarked on its journey of becoming an imperial power by fighting against the Spanish in the “splendid little war” of 1898. During this time the Philippines were being attacked in more ways than one, for instance, the Spanish and Americans were fighting both each other and small pox (Hays 192). On the other front, Filipinos were fighting for their sovereignty as well as a plague and cholera epidemic. However, since cholera was termed the “filth disease” by public health experts,