Introduction to Water - A Historical Perspective Water, Sanitation and Health - Part II
Interestingly, there were several things the city of chicago did to try and help respond to this situation. One thing they did was they moved the water intake two miles out into lake michigan. So rather than getting the drinking water right from the shores of lake michigan where the waste was going into, they were now getting the water from two miles out away from the shore, and that helped to reduce the number of deaths due to typhoid fever. They also reversed the flow of the the sewage canal.
They actually raised the city of chicago so that the canal would flow in the opposite direction, and that also reduced the deaths due to typhoid fever. There were incidents though that caused an increase in the number of deaths due to typhoid fever. A famous example is the great chicago fire. You may remember the story of ms. O' leary's cow knocked over the lantern, and the great chicago fire happened. And as the firefighters were trying to put out these fires, all the water they were putting on the buildings washed waste into lake michigan, and so there was an increase in the number of deaths due to typhoid fever.
So this is an example of something that actually caused an increase in the number of deaths. In chicago one of the few buildings that survived that great chicago fire is the water tower, the chicago water tower. And so if you're thereyou can, as I did, go to visit this landmark, and you can see one of the only buildings that survived the great chicago fire. So it really shows the resilience of the city of chicago to be able to come back after that devastating fire, but also points to the importance that safe water had to the health and the vitality and the growth of the city of chicago. And it's now a historic landmark as well as an icon for the city of chicago. So now we've looked at cholera in london in the mid- 1800s. We've looked at typhoid fever in chicago in the late 1800s. Now let's fast forward to milwaukee in 1993.
So we learned about the spread of diseasecholera, typhoid fever, and it implemented water treatment and that had great improvement in health and great reductions in the number of deaths. But now we find ourselves in 1993 in milwaukee. And milwaukee, 600, 000 people in milwaukee at this time. Again on lake michigan as chicago, and there was an outbreak of cryptosporidium yet another pathogen that causes a disease and deaths. And there were 400, 000 people in 1993 that reported getting sick from this outbreak. And there were on the order of 50 to 70 people that died, and many many thousands of people hospitalized. This was a time before we really understood cryptosporidium.
It was a more recent pathogen of concern, and it was a time when we learned, several things happened all at the same time to lead to these deaths. There was record rainfall, and the lake was turbid, was murky because of all this runoff and all this erosion, and so that happened. And then the water treatment plant had just changed the chemical that they were using to treat the water. Up to this time chlorine was the most common way of disinfecting the water and making it safe to drink. But since this time we've realized that chlorine's not as effective with cryptosporidium as it is with cholera and typhoid fever, and so this has led to ozone, and UV light as other ways of disinfecting the water. But here we see in more recent times the outbreak of disease and we see that it only takes a couple things going wrong all at the same time. And we see this when there's a national a natural catastrophea tornado or flood, and the system is compromised.
All of a sudden the water's unsafe, and so we find ourselves back in the 1800, if you will, in those times. Or we find ourselves in the same situation as people in developing countries today, who where you still have 2 million deaths a year, mainly children dying because of these waterborne diseases. So we find that we've seen through these three case studies: london in the mid- 1800, chicago the late 1800, milwaukie 1993 the importance of water and health and the importance of preventing wastewater sanitation from harming our water supply and causing the spread of disease. And this is most, one of the most important things we do.
The british medical society did a study to evaluate what medical advance has saved more lives than any other medical advance in the last 150 years. And the thing that came out number one in that study was water and sanitation, critical to public health that we know the today. And just one final comment: one of my hobbies is reading abraham lincoln biographies, and abraham lincoln had four sons. Only one of those four sons lived to adulthood. One died in spring field, missouri before lincoln went to become president, one died while he was in the white house of typhoid fever in washington DC, and then one died actually after lincoln was assassinated of tuberculosis. Only one of his four sons lived to adulthood.
You see you could say that we were a developing country, the united states, at this time period, but we've had the good fortune of medical advances, and we have the resources, the economy to support good public health. And that makes us think of those people in developing countries who are less fortunate and we need to help them to come to where we are today. So hopefully you have a better understanding through this lecture of the importance, the critical importance of water and health and the role that it plays in the health that we enjoy today.
They actually raised the city of chicago so that the canal would flow in the opposite direction, and that also reduced the deaths due to typhoid fever. There were incidents though that caused an increase in the number of deaths due to typhoid fever. A famous example is the great chicago fire. You may remember the story of ms. O' leary's cow knocked over the lantern, and the great chicago fire happened. And as the firefighters were trying to put out these fires, all the water they were putting on the buildings washed waste into lake michigan, and so there was an increase in the number of deaths due to typhoid fever.
So this is an example of something that actually caused an increase in the number of deaths. In chicago one of the few buildings that survived that great chicago fire is the water tower, the chicago water tower. And so if you're thereyou can, as I did, go to visit this landmark, and you can see one of the only buildings that survived the great chicago fire. So it really shows the resilience of the city of chicago to be able to come back after that devastating fire, but also points to the importance that safe water had to the health and the vitality and the growth of the city of chicago. And it's now a historic landmark as well as an icon for the city of chicago. So now we've looked at cholera in london in the mid- 1800s. We've looked at typhoid fever in chicago in the late 1800s. Now let's fast forward to milwaukee in 1993.
So we learned about the spread of diseasecholera, typhoid fever, and it implemented water treatment and that had great improvement in health and great reductions in the number of deaths. But now we find ourselves in 1993 in milwaukee. And milwaukee, 600, 000 people in milwaukee at this time. Again on lake michigan as chicago, and there was an outbreak of cryptosporidium yet another pathogen that causes a disease and deaths. And there were 400, 000 people in 1993 that reported getting sick from this outbreak. And there were on the order of 50 to 70 people that died, and many many thousands of people hospitalized. This was a time before we really understood cryptosporidium.
It was a more recent pathogen of concern, and it was a time when we learned, several things happened all at the same time to lead to these deaths. There was record rainfall, and the lake was turbid, was murky because of all this runoff and all this erosion, and so that happened. And then the water treatment plant had just changed the chemical that they were using to treat the water. Up to this time chlorine was the most common way of disinfecting the water and making it safe to drink. But since this time we've realized that chlorine's not as effective with cryptosporidium as it is with cholera and typhoid fever, and so this has led to ozone, and UV light as other ways of disinfecting the water. But here we see in more recent times the outbreak of disease and we see that it only takes a couple things going wrong all at the same time. And we see this when there's a national a natural catastrophea tornado or flood, and the system is compromised.
All of a sudden the water's unsafe, and so we find ourselves back in the 1800, if you will, in those times. Or we find ourselves in the same situation as people in developing countries today, who where you still have 2 million deaths a year, mainly children dying because of these waterborne diseases. So we find that we've seen through these three case studies: london in the mid- 1800, chicago the late 1800, milwaukie 1993 the importance of water and health and the importance of preventing wastewater sanitation from harming our water supply and causing the spread of disease. And this is most, one of the most important things we do.
The british medical society did a study to evaluate what medical advance has saved more lives than any other medical advance in the last 150 years. And the thing that came out number one in that study was water and sanitation, critical to public health that we know the today. And just one final comment: one of my hobbies is reading abraham lincoln biographies, and abraham lincoln had four sons. Only one of those four sons lived to adulthood. One died in spring field, missouri before lincoln went to become president, one died while he was in the white house of typhoid fever in washington DC, and then one died actually after lincoln was assassinated of tuberculosis. Only one of his four sons lived to adulthood.
You see you could say that we were a developing country, the united states, at this time period, but we've had the good fortune of medical advances, and we have the resources, the economy to support good public health. And that makes us think of those people in developing countries who are less fortunate and we need to help them to come to where we are today. So hopefully you have a better understanding through this lecture of the importance, the critical importance of water and health and the role that it plays in the health that we enjoy today.
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