Download or read book Public Health and Politics in the Age of Reform written by David McLean and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2005-10-28 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cholera was the scourge of nineteenth century Britain, with four devastating epidemics sweeping the country from the 1830s to the 1860s. David McLean provides a detailed study of the efforts of local and national government efforts to combat the disease. Based on a unique cache of documents, McLean's account exposes the struggles between local and national government as they grappled with the enormity of the problem and the conflict between policies of laissez-faire and state intervention. Describing the efforts of public health reformer Edwin Chadwick in conjunction with among others, Prime Minister Lord Russell, Admiral Lord Cochrane and local Plymouth leader Joseph Beer, McLean brings to life a vital period in British social and political history with policy consequences that reverberate today.