Pandemics in Chicago-- Part 4: The 1866 Cholera Epidemic

A military leader sounding the alarm about a disease spreading?  And, not knowing the causes of it or what to do for sure?  Sounds a bit similar to what we have these days.  Who says history does not repeat itself.  Personally, at age 68, I never thought I'd be in one of these disease events right now.  I kind of thought that was a thing of the past.

The causes of cholera weren't well known at the time.  One thought would be considered an ugly xenophobic speculation that immigrants coming to the city caused it.

A thousand Chicagoans would die in the next cholera epidemic in 1866, including Dr. Daniel Brainard, founder of Rush University and hospital, who had studied the disease a lot.  The Tribune called the disease "the grim destroyer" and it killed about a third of the people who caught it."

It was after this third wave that the city began working to fight it.  They still didn't quite understand where it came from. but they'd figured out that good sanitation would help.

--DaCoot