The fight against cholera
The Broad Street Pump
Careful observations and the analysis of the data helped to show that a new disease was spread by contaminated drinking water. An early example of the science of epidemiology.
Frightening epidemics
A series of severe cholera outbreaks gripped London and other parts of the country from the 1830s. Cholera was a new disease in Britain. The disease spread very rapidly. The epidemic in 1831 ?2 killed 32 000 people in 3 months.
Famously the doctor John Snow confirmed his theory that the disease was passed from one person to another through drinking water in 1854 by removing the handle of the Broad Street pump. He had noticed that 500 men women and children living within a little over 200 metres from the pump at the junction of Cambridge Street and Broad Street had died from cholera in 10 days. All who died had drunk water from the pump.
John Snow persuaded the local officials to remove the handle from the pump. Within a few days the local epidemic began to subside.
The pump today
The pump is not there any more but you can see where it was outside the John Snow pub. There is a sign on the wall of the pub. If the pub is open there are some pictures in the bar upstairs of John Snow and the street as it was in his life time.
There is also a replica of the pump with another sign a little bit further along the road where the street is wider.
Submitted by: Paul Bowers Isaacson and students from North Westminster Community School, 15 January 2007
