Chapter 5 Annotations

Berridge, Virginia. (2016). Public Health: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford, United Kingdom. Retrieved from Oxford University Press.

From 1900 to 1980 the public health field greatly advanced. Welfare clinics and healthcare facilities were created during World War I while the public health focus shifted to women and children while husbands were away. New illness were appearing and increasing mortality rates such as many sexually transmitted diseases and tuberculosis. While mortality due to these issues was on the rise, after the war issues with alcohol and other disease issues began to decline. In this time, education became an extremely important factor of public health. More responsibilities were delegated to public health professionals, yet there was still no real definition or concrete goal for what public health really was at the time. War times were difficult for everyone and every aspect of life, and the hope was that situations would improve after the war. However, this was not the case. Improvements after the war were tedious and slow. Public health focus went from focused on the individual and social medicine to chronic diseases and the lasting effects of diseases as opposed to what the causes of these issues actually were. Methods such as quarantine and vaccination became less important in the public health field in this time as focus shifted to smokers and diet. Again, this information could be used in my research as the shifts in public health and reforms took place, just as there should be some in current times.