ABSTRACT

Throughout the ages it has been recognised that the aggregation of people in cities is accompanied by intensification of epidemic disease and by lowering of the standard of health. Social history consists largely in a statement of efforts to counteract these maleficent tendencies by regulation and improvement of housing, of sewerage, of water supplies, of ventilation, and of food. This chapter attempts to give a few illustrations of evils and of action attempted against these. It also shows that no study of the growth of preventive medicine is complete which does not comprise some reference to domestic and municipal sanitation and a survey of the increasingly high standards of conduct as regards destitution, cruelty and vice. These problems are discussed in many works, and the wise physician, whether in preventive or curative medicine, is conversant with these wider aspects of his daily work. The growth of humanitarian ideals spread gradually to every branch of social and industrial life.