WET 219 - Applied Water Law

Paul Fürst, engraving (coloured), c. 1656, of a plague doctor of Marseilles (introduced as 'Dr Beaky of Rome'). His nose case is filled with herbal material to ward off the plague.

London, England had a big problem in the mid-1800s. Cholera (a disease that causes an infection in the small intestine) broke out and spread rapidly because of poor sanitation which led to drinking water sources being contaminated.

The Cholera outbreak from 1848-49 killed approximately 54,000-62,000 in London, and the outbreak from 1853-54 killed an estimated 31,000 in the city.

Physicians thought that Cholera was spread by the foul air permeating the City, the so-called “Miasma Theory.” 

A prominent London physician named Dr. John Snow a pioneer in the development and use of anesthetics also was keenly interested in the spread of disease, particularly Cholera.

Snow reasoned that if the Miasma Theory was true, then sewer workers and people who worked closer to the river would have a higher incidence of developing Cholera. Snow found that this wasn’t the case he reasoned that there was something else involved.

In 1854 he decided that he was going to get to the bottom of the problem. His first action was to interview patients sick with Cholera. Through the interviews, he discovered that they all got their water from the same local water pump. He then made a map of the area and began to plot the Chloria cases on the map. The map showed a concentration of Cholera cases around a water pump located at the corner of Broad Street and Cambridge Street.

To safeguard the population he visited the water pump and removed its handle so that people could not use the contaminated water. 

Further investigation determined that this pump was dug in too close proximity to a cesspit which was contaminated with the Cholera and which had been leaching contaminated material into the water well.

That map became known as “The Ghost Map”.

Cholera continues to kill people. In 2023, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control reported from 1 January 2023 and 18 December 2023, 879 177 Cholera cases were reported worldwide, including 5,045 deaths, have been reported worldwide.

Every one of you will be directly involved in the battle to make sure that Cholera (or other preventable pathogens) is neutralized, and wherever possible eradicated. 

The provision of potable drinking water and proper sanitation has saved more lives than any other public health measure in the past 150 years.

Public Healthcare in Canada is a joint responsibility of the Provincial through the Ministry of Health and the Federal Government via Health Canada. Primary jurisdiction for Healthcare rests at the Provincial level of government. 

In his pioneering work "History of Public Health", published in 1958, George Rosen, the great medical historian and professor of public health at Yale University, suggested that ‘The protection and promotion of the health and welfare of its citizens is considered to be one of the most important functions of the modern state.’ 

Dorothy Porter. (2020). The History of Public Health and the Modern State. Brill.

As with all crises, they often inspire new and innovative ways of thinking and technologies to help put an end to them. For example, SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) has led to the use of wastewater surveillance to identify potential outbreaks.

Wastewater surveillance has been an active aspect of the wastewater treatment regime. With the outback of SAR-Cov-2 its awareness and use increased.

For example, it is now being used by the Government of NWT to identify the occurrence of COVID-19, Influenza, Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV), and Tuberculosis (TB) Bacteria.