The shade of Dr James Barry cannot even

[oursin]

We rather assume that the Doctor would have supposed that the world would have moved on in respect of the C19th constraints around gender and would be extremely distressed at the present moral panic around non-conformity.

But possibly even more appalling would be the realisation that so many problems of disease had been solved, means of prevention been devised, and principles of hygiene better understood than they were. (I fancy that someone who performed a successful caesarean operation in the 1820s was probably empirically already upon the lines subsequently laid out by Semmelweiss, hmmm?).

And that people are refusing them and throwing them out.

Many years ago I read an sf thriller - one of those 'set in a plausible fairly near future' - in which the protag was a medical professional dealing with infectious diseases, and initially unable to understand why once common ailments that were routinely vaccinated against were being seen in the hospital.

I can't remember whether - it must have been written about the time of population explosion anxieties - it was just that Evil Government was issuing fake vaccines that did not work, or actually injecting the populace with once forgotten diseases, but the end result was the same.

But at least they understood, even if they turned it to Evil, the principles involved, rather than waving their hands and pronouncing woo-woo.

Comments

[conuly]

You may know this, but sometime in the 1800s, the 1900s the British Empire just... forgot how to prevent scurvy.

[oursin]

'What is this requisition for lime-juice? some hangover from Nelson's day....'

Story

[lsanderson]

There's an excellent article on that that I have not seen for too long with all the details.

[lokifan]

For real!!!

[silveradept]

Yes, I suspect many a person whose life was greatly improved through advances in understanding and prevention of communicable disease would look at those who are refusing or spreading misinformation about such with pity, contempt, or rage.

[disassembly_rsn]

The SF thriller sounds like Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's Time of the Fourth Horseman.

[oursin]

That does indeed ring a bell - late 70s or so?

[disassembly_rsn]

Yes; ISFDB says it was published in 1976.

It does indeed have the population explosion anxiety issue. The Evil Government conspiracy, in their inimitable way, had arranged for dud vaccines for *multiple* diseases, and for the double word score I think they had also let loose some exceptionally bad strain of an infectious disease. Things went very bad very quickly.

Caveat: I haven't read that book in years and do not currently have a copy, so I am summarizing from memory.

[oursin]

That sounds familiar - that it started with the dud vaccines but then it escalated to letting plague loose on the population. That never ends well, but this is like the characters in horror movies who have never watched horror movies and therefore go down to the cellar alone - nobody in these scenarios has ever read the right sort of books or seen apocalyptic movies that might have given them some caution.