Thank you for doing this AMA Dr Harris!

I'd like to ask about the history of compulsory smallpox vaccinations in the UK. The 1853 Vaccination act made it compulsory for children to recieve the vaccination within 3 months of their birth.

Was there much opposition to mandatory vaccines? Were there any anti-vax movements comparable to modern day ones?

Hi Dr Harris! Thank you for doing this AMA!

My question is, when did the British scientific and public health community decisively shift away from the miasma theory as a cause of infectious diseases? Part of my current research revolves around the bubonic plague outbreak in Hong Kong in 1894, and I was surprised to see colonial surgeons and hospital superintendents, who by all accounts received excellent medical training at Edinburgh or London and continued to engage in scholarly debate through medical journals such as the Lancet, continue to subscribe to the miasma theory even into the early 20th century. Is this reflective of the slow dissemination of information across the British Empire, or was subscription to the miasma theory still prevalent within the British medical community at the turn of the century?

Was the 1918 Flu Epidemic the first major use of masks in an effort to combat the spread of infection? If not, when did it come to be recognized as an effective method, and in either case, what was the process like for public health education in that period to encourage mask wearing?

Thanks for this!

I'm curious about Y. Pestis outbreaks in the early modern and modern state (whatever you feel comfortable talking about). Nowadays, mentioning "The Plague ☠️" causes a really strong imaginative response, even though the y. Pestis bacteria is very easily treatable with modern medicine.

Did that response exist in the UK or British colonies during the late outbreaks of the 2nd Plague Pandemic in the late 17th and early 18th centuries or in the 3rd Plague Pandemic, and if so, did the central state make efforts to combat or encourage it?

Thanks for doing the AMA Dr Harris, currently a student at OSU so this is really cool to see!

My questions is, I know the allied nations attempted to keep the 1918 flu secret from the public but what was the British government doing about it at the time if anything? Also, how did the general public react? Thanks!

Hi Dr Harris, was wondering what the opposition to John snow was with the cholera outbreak in England in the Victorian era. Was he believed before he removed the pump handle or after?

Would also like to ask if there was any examples or reasons to why Joseph lister was so unliked and outcasted.

Thanks

Hi Dr. Harris — thanks for participating in this AMA!

I was wondering if you could talk at all about connections between 19th/early 20th century British xenophobia and understandings of infectious diseases. Today, we hear a lot of racist invective that compares immigration to an "infection" or a "plague", or suggesting that migrants themselves are more likely to carry diseases. This kind of rhetoric is of course hateful, but seems to me like they also rest on at least a certain basic understanding of germ theory and how disease spread.

Do you know if these sorts of comparisons or inferences were being made during the time period you study, which also saw an increase in immigration to Britain? Were contemporary scientists at all engaged in these discussions?

Hi Dr. Harris, thanks for doing this!

You said you're looking at the role of the state in British public health. Which diseases was the state most involved in fighting against? Or were state initiatives for health mostly focused on social reform and city works like sewers?

Hi Dr. Harris:

Thanks for stopping by. Two unrelated questions.

First, your comment in the Columbus Dispatch made me curious if the British response to the 1918 pandemic varied across local councils (as it did with their equivalents in the US), or was it mandated from up top? And given wartime censorship, how have you approached primary source research for it?

Second, while I (think!) I'm familiar with the general story of the advent of the NHS in postwar Britain, any good survey recommendations on its implementation?

Thanks much!

Thank you for doing this AMA Dr Harris!

Coming from Vietnam where our own state was relatively successful in controlling the pandemic, I find it incredibly interesting that in many places, one of the problem is getting the general population to cooperate with the state in fighting the virus. While, or perhaps because, transparency IS a problem in many facets of Vietnamese state-people interaction, what transpire during the efforts to control the pandemic was well received by the people.

My question is thus from your study, had the British state ever faced this problem, where the practices as recommend by the state face resistance from the patients or perhaps even the staff themselves due to distrust? Perhaps some unknown anti vax reaction when vaccines was first introduced, perhaps?

My secondary question is if yes, how did the British state overcome it? Did it simply let time and the increase healthiness of those who follow government protocol to speak for itself? Did it enforce public health practice by force (counting monetary fine)? Did it invest into "advertising" itself?

Allo Dr. Harris. I am wondering what was different between the relative amount of British Conservative support for better access to healthcare for British average citizens (such as the NHS) compared to the American Conservative rejection of similar ideas at around the same time? Apologies if this question is already answered and I just can't find it here, or if it's outside your speciality.

Hi Dr. Harris!

Could you talk a little bit about the 1918 Flu Pandemic and how it interacted with World War I? I'm especially curious about whether the military alliances operating at the time had any impact in terms of creating collaboration between allied states, or whether the combination of war and pandemic made countries even less likely to work together (given, of course, the lack of supranational international institutions to begin with).

Hello Dr Harris! Thanks so much for coming by!

Did the H3N2 Pandemic of 1968 had any unique effects not found in other pandemics? While there's a lot of comparisons between the current pandemic and 1918, are there any lessons specifically from 1968 that are more applicable to modern practice?

Hello Dr. Harris, It’s well known that colonists in the America’s spread smallpox to devastating effect, with a crushing mortality rate among the indigenous population who had no immunity to the disease. Why were diseases from other continents not a barrier to colonization? I’m thinking specifically of yellow fever and malaria in Africa, but I’m sure there must be diseases indigenous to North and South America as well. Is there any record of correspondence among European colonizers discussing high mortality due to these diseases, or what they did to prevent it?

Dr. Harris - again, thank you for the AMA; my question is, I think, quite simple although maybe outside of your research: can you describe the English press' reporting of the 1918 influenza. Were there, as we're seeing now, partisan differences amongst the various papers regarding how it was reported? And, if so, were those differences reflected in the public at large?

Hi Dr Harris, thank you for doing this AMA. My question may be slightly out of your wheelhouse but I thought you might have some insight.

I recently saw someone make the argument that the framers (or founding fathers) would have been totally down with quarantine/masking because there were comparable public health crises in the late 1700s—specifically in Philadelphia with yellow fever.

Was that outbreak considered a pandemic? What were early methods to combat the spread of infectious disease?

Hi Dr Harris, many civilizations have these disappearing episodes. The Aztecs, Mycenaeans, Hittites, The Mound Indians. What do we know of the microbial vestiges buried around these civilizations that can bring an end to these mysteries surrounding these disappearances?

Hi Dr. Harris, thanks for being here today! Looking back on the history of infectious disease, I've noticed that we still don't know the actual pathogens that caused many historically recorded pandemics. Two questions: how do scholars go about reconstructing the causes of historical pandemics in the first place? And do you think we will ever find out the "mystery bugs" behind such events as the Plague of Athens?

Hi Dr. Harris,

Thank you for doing this AMA (and Go Bucks!)

My question shades into political history, so apologies if this is outside your area of expertise. In your view, did the rise of the Labour party in Britain between 1900-1922 lead to any changes in the prevailing political conceptions of public health?

To ask another way, how did the trade unionist movement as a political movement alter/change/etc how public health was conceptualized and practiced in early 20th century Britain?

Hi Dr Harris! Thanks for doing this! I’m wondering if you think COVID-19 is “the big one” that we’ll see in this generation, or are we in for more and even bigger global pandemics in the near future?

Thanks for doing this AMA Dr. Harris.

When in history did physicians become more likely to save your life than kill you?

I have seen suggestions it was only about 1920.

Hi Dr. Harris, this is a history alum of Adrian College😊. Your answers have been exceptionally interesting. I look forward to your answer to the question regards the effect of rise of the British Labour Movement on public health policy.

Hi Dr. Harris, thanks for your time today!

How exactly can vaccines even “expire”? And why do they expire so soon. Is there any way to make their shelf life longer? Sorry if this is a really simple question.

Thanks Dr. Harris, what would you say from your research so far is the (or your current favourite) most effectively handled pandemic you have come across, and the least - and what lessons could be learned from each?

I'm afraid I have to hop off now. More work awaits--such as a chapter proposal I'm working on on the school as a sight of public health administration in early 20th century Britain. Thank you all for your great questions! It was my pleasure to answer as many as I could these last two hours. Be safe and stay healthy!

Jim Harris, Ph.D.

Hi Dr. Harris, how did the Spanish Influenza affect religious services and other regular social functions in Britain? Were masses still held? Was capacity reduced? How did people feel about these actions or lack thereof?

Hi Dr Harris! I took your class last semester with Dr Summers and it was a pleasure! Thank you for taking the time to answer these questions and allowing people to become more informed about these topics!!!

Was the plague of Justinian likely caused by yersinia pestis? If not, what is the best guess for its cause?

Thanks for being here. How did you become interested in history?

Was croatian culture tolerated in the kingdom of Hungary?

Hi Jim!!!!

I love the Tudor time period of British history. Has it ever been discovered what the sweating sickness was? I know that the Tudor court went to great lengths to avoid it, then it's not mentioned again.

What can history tell us about disinformation and propaganda related to pandemics? I know the 1918 influenza was widely censored and there was no shortage of ignorance, but I'm more curious about active campaigns to push agendas impacted by by pandemics.

Hi Dr. Harris, How common was (were?) Scabies during the turn of the 20th century (or earlier) and what treatments did we have for it before Permitherin was invented?

Also. When did pharmacies switch from places where pharmacists would have to mix the medicine as instructed by doctors into places where you can only pick up pills and packaged medicines.

Thanks!