第二次霍乱流行

The second cholera pandemic (1826–1837), also known as the Asiatic cholera pandemic, was a cholera pandemic that reached from India across Western Asia to Europe, Great Britain, and the Americas, as well as east to China and Japan. Cholera caused more deaths than any other epidemic disease in the 19th century, and as such, researchers consider it a defining epidemic disease of the century. The medical community now believes cholera to be exclusively a human disease, spread through many means of travel during the time, and transmitted through warm fecal-contaminated river waters and contaminated foods. During the second pandemic, the scientific community varied in its beliefs about the causes of cholera.

History

First pandemic

The first cholera pandemic (1817–24) began near Kolkata and spread throughout Southeast Asia to the Middle East, eastern Africa, and the Mediterranean coast. While cholera had spread across India many times previously, this outbreak went farther; it reached as far as China and the Mediterranean Sea before receding. Hundreds of thousands of people died as a result of this pandemic, including many British soldiers from the presidency armies, which attracted European attention. This was the first of several cholera pandemics to sweep through Asia and Europe during the 19th and 20th centuries. This first pandemic spread over an unprecedented range of territory, affecting many countries throughout Asia.

Origins of the second pandemic

Historians believe that the first pandemic had lingered in Indonesia and the Philippines in 1830.

Although not much is known about the journey of the cholera pandemic in east India, many believe that this pandemic began, like the first, with outbreaks along the Ganges Delta in India. From there, the disease spread along trade routes to cover most of India. By 1828, the disease had traveled to China. Cholera was also reported in China in 1826 and 1835, and in Japan in 1831. In 1829, Iran was apparently infected with cholera from Afghanistan.

Cholera reached the southern tips of the Ural Mountains in 1829.……

1830s

The second cholera pandemic spread from the Russian Empire to the rest of Europe, claiming hundreds of thousands of lives.……

Causes

During the second pandemic, the scientific community varied in its beliefs about the causes of cholera. In France, doctors believed cholera was associated with the poverty of certain communities or poor environment. Russians believed the disease was contagious, although doctors did not understand how it spread. The United States believed that cholera was brought by recent immigrants, specifically the Irish, and epidemiologists understand they were carrying disease from British ports. Lastly, the British thought the disease might rise from divine intervention.

Legacy

Norwegian poet Henrik Wergeland wrote a stage play inspired by the pandemic, which had reached Norway. In The Indian Cholera (Den indiske Cholera, 1835), he set his play in Colonial India, lambasting the poor response to the pandemic by authorities.

In response to the second cholera pandemic, the Ottoman Empire and Egypt reformed their quarantine systems, following the western Mediterranean model. In 1831, the Egyptian Quarantine Board was established. It constructed Egypt's first modern lazaretto in Alexandria in 1833. In 1831, the Ottoman government set up the first permanent quarantine complex in Istanbul. In 1838, the Ottoman government established the Supreme Council of Health, which oversaw 59 quarantines. While largely useless against cholera, these quarantines shored up the two countries' epidemiological defenses against bubonic plague.

As a result of the epidemic, the medical community developed a major advance, the intravenous saline drip. It was developed from the work of Dr. Thomas Latta of Leith, near Edinburgh. Latta established from blood studies that a saline drip greatly improved the condition of patients and saved many lives by preventing dehydration. Latta died in 1833 of tuberculosis.

A major outbreak in Sligo, Ireland, was reported on by Charlotte Thornley;……