Over the last 13 years, my mom went from a fast-moving and passionate high school teacher often described as “Mach […]
The American Murderer: Hookworm Eradication Among “Our Native Born Whites”
In the United States and around the world, public health has taken center stage in recent years to investigate how […]
“Weather Bad and Whales Un-cooperative”: The Misadventures of Mid-Century Whale Cardiology Expeditions
In the mid-1950s, newspapers and magazines excitedly reported on scientist-explorers undertaking daring expeditions to harpoon gray whales off the North […]
Losing ‘sorrow in stupefaction’: American Women’s Opiate Dependency before 1900
In 1791 Elizabeth Blake tried to help her sister, New Yorker Catalina Hale, to end her years-long dependency on laudanum, […]
The Congella Mangrove Story: A Colonial Durban Econarrative
At the mouth of the Umgeni River in Durban, South Africa, sits a small patch of mangrove trees. Birds flit […]
Making Malaria History
Recently global headlines celebrated the news that the World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended the RTS,S vaccine for use against […]
The World Celebrates the First Malaria Vaccine—But Don’t Expect Malaria to Disappear
On October 6, 2021, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced it was recommending the first malaria vaccine, known as RTS,S, […]
Black Before Florence: Black Nurses, Enslaved Labor, and the British Royal Navy, 1790–1820
Throughout the eighteenth century, the British Royal Navy embarked on a scheme of hospital construction in the Atlantic World. The […]
Architecting a “New Normal”? Past Pandemics and the Medicine of Urban Planning
COVID-19 isn’t going anywhere. Months into the global pandemic, when many parts of the world have entered a second wave […]
Dr. Fauci and My Mom
In these scary times, many of us find comfort in watching Dr. Anthony Fauci on TV. I like seeing Dr. […]
