Urban health theory
Introduction
Hygienism is a way of life that was born in the first half of the century with liberalism, when rulers began to pay more attention to the health of the city and its inhabitants. Disease was considered a social phenomenon that encompassed all aspects of human life.[1] The need to maintain certain health conditions in the city environment through the installation of running water, sewers, street lighting, and to be able to control epidemics gave shape to this current, which was based on:
It accentuated the political and social duties of doctors and constituted the future design of policies that sought to limit the impact of social inequality brought about by economic modernization;[3] as a consequence of the Industrial Revolution carried out in the 2nd century.
From this, the new cities were designed taking into account the ventilation of the houses, the paving of the streets, the construction of sewers, etc. Being able to consume water without posing any risk to human health meant a before and after in people's quality of life.
Origin
Until the beginning of the century, the overcrowding and poverty that affected a large part of the population caused epidemics aggravated by malnutrition. Doctors began to denounce living conditions as the primary cause of diseases.
The first documented cases of Hygienism are found in 1848 with the publication of the “Public Health Act” in England by Edwin Chadwick, where he not only proposed a way to combat the high mortality and epidemic diseases that were leading to industrial cities, but also a means of neutralizing worker radicalization and growing social unrest. Two years later, the first Hygienist Law was enacted in France.
In Vienna, the doctor J.P. Frank published The misery of the people, mother of diseases, a work that influenced others such as Turner Thackrah, Arnold, Chadwick, Villermé and Virchow, who contributed to creating hygienism as part of medicine, to eradicate diseases such as cholera or yellow fever.[4].
In Spain the current gained strength in the second half of the century, after the death of Ferdinand VII, helped by social changes and promoted by doctors such as Rodríguez Méndez.[4].
In Buenos Aires, Hygienism as a movement emerged in the second half of the 19th century, introducing the concept of public health as we know it today. Public health is no longer understood as the sole function of combating diseases or preventing epidemics from spreading (as was yellow fever), but rather its concept is beginning to expand given that population health integrates the physical, mental and social well-being of men that points to the "quality of life" of people. All this requires intervention by the State.[5].