The Public Health Act of 1848 was the outcome of Chadwick’s Sanitary report and the pressure applied on Parliament by the Health of Towns Association.
Public Health Act 1848
The legislation went some way towards acieving the goals of Chadwick and the Association. The main features of the act were:
-
The establishment of a Central Board of health
-
Responsibility for water supplies and drainage, amongst other things, was given to corporations
-
Permission was granted to towns that did not have corporation status to have a Local Board of health
-
Taxes would be levied, locally, to pay for the improvements
-
Where the death rate exceeded 23 in every 1000, a Local Board of health could be imposed by the Central Board of health
This act was one of the first to challenge the notion of Laissez-Faire. however it had its limitations. The Central board of Health had limited funds and there was no compulsion to ensure that officials were suitably trained or qualified. Within some localities there was hostility to interference from cetral government and this led to inadequate improvements being made. Health was still not a ministerial responsibility, and therefore the power of the Central Board of health was limited.
Public Health in the Industrial Revolution
Impact of new machines – Workhouses in Bradford and Leeds – Typhoid outbreaks 1830 – 1836 – Cholera, 1831 Outbreak – Poor Law Commission [1834, Report 1837] – Poor Law Commission 1835 – Bradford Woolcombers Report, 1837 – Report on the conditions of workers in Leeds, 1842 – Report on the sanitary Condition of the Labouring Classes, Chadwick 1842 – Health of Towns Association, 1844 – Health in Bradford in the mid 1840’s – Health in Manchester, 1844 – Public Health Act, 1848 – Working Conditions in Bradford, 1850 – Census figures: UK Population statistics 1831 – 1851 – John Snow’s work on Cholera, 1854 – Nightingale School of Nursing – Bradford Sewage Works, 1862 – Louis Pasteur: Germ Theory, 1865 – Second Reform Act [External] – Royal Sanitary Commission, 1869 – The Public Health Act, 1872 [External] – Public Health Act, 1875 [External] – Artizans and Labourers’ Dwellings Improvement Act, 1875 [External] – Tuberculosis Germ identified by Robert Koch, 1882 – Cholera Germ identified, 1883 – Health in Bradford, Margaret McMillan’s Report, 1890 – Report into the health of Children in Bradford, 1907 – Timeline of Public Health over time – Medicine and Treatments c1350-2018 – Themes in Medical History
Medicine Through time
Resources for Medicine Through Time – Prehistoric Medicine – Ancient Egyptian Medicine – Ancient Greek Medicine – Medicine in the Roman Empire – Medieval Medicine – Renaissance Medicine – Public Health in the Industrial Revolution – Fight against infectious disease – Modern Medicine