Cholera in London, 1854: Case Study (Edexcel GCSE History): Revision Note

The impact of cholera on public health - Summary

• Cholera arrived in Britain in 1831

• It thrived in overcrowded industrial cities with poor sanitation

• The most severe was in 1848-49, when over 53,000 people across England and Wales died

• Like the plague in the medieval and Renaissance periods, cholera was without a cure

  • Many people believed that miasma spread cholera

  • It actually was a waterborne disease, spread through dirty drinking water

• John Snow's work on the 1854 Soho outbreak was a turning point, even if the government ignored it at first

  • Eventually, the work of Pasteur and Koch provided the scientific backing to Snow’s theory on cholera

Fighting cholera

What was cholera?

• Cholera was a deadly disease that arrived in Britain in 1831

  • Scientists believe that British soldiers in India brought home the disease

• Cholera was caused by:

  • Contact with another person

  • Drinking water contaminated with faeces from a cholera victim

Symptoms of cholera

• Lasted for two to five days before the victim died of dehydration

Cholera in London

• In February 1832, cholera hit London

  • It mostly affected slums, workhouses, prisons and asylums

  • Approximately 5,275 people had died in London by the end of 1832

Government reaction to cholera

• Scientists and the government believed miasma caused cholera

  • To reduce miasma, they attempted to clean up the worst areas of London

• In 1848, during a severe cholera outbreak, the government released the first Public Health Act

  • The Act was not compulsory so many local authorities did not implement it

John Snow

• John Snow was a respected doctor and anaesthetist in London

• He:

  • Gave Queen Victoria chloroform in 1851

  • Lived in Soho, a poor, overcrowded area of London

• In 1849, Snow published On the Mode of Communication of Cholera. He suggested that:

  • Cholera was not caused by miasma

  • Victims caught cholera by drinking contaminated water

• Snow had no scientific evidence

The 1854 epidemic

• In August 1854, 93 people died in a cholera outbreak in Soho

• Snow created a spot map of the deaths

  • He concluded that deaths centred around the water pump on Broad Street

• Snow's investigation proved his theory correct

  • The Broad Street pump was contaminated by a cracked cesspit

The impact of John Snow

Short-term impacts

• Snow stopped the cholera outbreak, saving many lives

• Officials ignored Snow's findings

• The Great Stink (1858) motivated the government to dispose of sewage correctly

• Snow died in 1858 without evidence to prove his theory

Long-term impacts

• Three years after Snow’s death, Pasteur released his Germ Theory

  • This proved Snow's theory correct

• Koch isolated cholera bacteria in 1884

• The Public Health Act of 1875 required towns to provide clean water