John Snow

John Snow

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• Bildunterschrift: 1854

Problem he looked at

• The cause of the 1854 cholera outbreak in London
• Looked at poorer places to see what caused it - mainly affected the poor
• How dirty water caused cholera- not bad air

What he found

• Realised that those who worked at the brewery didn't get cholera (as they only drank beer) but all those who got their water from the Broad St pump did
• Therefore, he cut off the water supply from the Broad St pump
• He provided them with clean water instead
• The number of cholera-infected plummeted to nothing!

Solutions he proposed

• Use water from cleaner sources
• Try and prevent waste getting into water systems, e.g. cholera-infected waste

Did anything change?

• Actions
• No actions were taken
• The Germ Theory hadn't been proved yet so he had no scientific proof
• How Successful?
• Showed it was important to spend money on public health
• Made the first link between dirty water and infection (even though it couldn't be proved for another 10 years)