ABSTRACT
French hygienists of the late nineteenth century were in a better position than ever to make an impact on the nation's health. In spite of the absence of an effective central public health bureaucracy, the public health movement was far from inactive in France in the first half of the nineteenth century. The discoveries of the bacteriological revolution provided the Comite consultatif d Hygiene publique (C.C.H.P) with rather straightforward and relatively simple answers to the two most serious contagious diseases which ravaged France in 1890's period, cholera and typhoid. 1889 was an important year for the C.C.H.P. A microbiological laboratory was established and France's first epidemiological service was organized. The C.C.H.P. found that local doctors were reluctant to accept the role of drinking water in the transmission of disease. Hygienists despaired at their inability to convince either the public or most private practitioners of the role which water played in contagious disease.
