Public Health In Britain During The Industrial Revolution

Account for the state of public health in Britain during the Industrial Revolution

The state of public health in Britain during the Industrial Revolution was very poor. There were many reasons why the standard of health was so bad. Leading up to the Industrial Revolution was the Agricultural Revolution, which brought about population growth and rural-urban migration. Houses were built very quickly, cheaply and poorly which meant there was no sanitation, very little running water, no sewerage drains and no waste collection. The poor housing resulted in a lot of death and disease, as did the working conditions. Poverty also contributed to the poor state of public health, as did the lack of medical knowledge. The state of public health did
Agriculture was based on an open field system, where fields were divided into strips, with farmers owning several strips which were spread out throughout the fields. This method of farming was very unproductive and in 1730 when Britain’s population began to grow, new farming techniques were needed to keep up with the increased demand for food. New techniques were brought in and therefore more food was available. The Agricultural Revolution is said to have been the beginning of the Industrial Revolution because of the new ideas which were used and were proven to work. The Industrial Revolution meant that Britain’s population increased, which led to rural-urban migration because many were leaving the country to go work in the new factories. Due to so many people migrating to the industrial towns, those towns became very overcrowded. One such town was London. In 1801, the population was 957,000 and in 1851, the population stood at 2,362,000. Due to a lot of overcrowding in the cities, there were a lot of diseases present which resulted in poor
Houses were built quickly and cheaply so no running water or plumbing was installed in them. Household waste was emptied on to the streets or into cesspits which had been emptied each night by the night-soil men. In 1841 in London, there were 200,000 cesspits which were full and overflowing. One shilling was charged by the night-soil men to empty each cesspit and many could not afford to pay, so cesspits were not emptied and filth accumulated in them. Running water was available from taps in the streets and these taps were usually turned on for a few hours each day. The water from these taps was almost always polluted and many diseases such as cholera and typhoid were spread via the infected waters. In London, a sewerage system had been built, but it was only for surface run-off. These sewers could not cope with eh amounts of sewerage being emptied into them, so they broke and overflowed. Horses were used for transport during the Industrial Revolution and other animals were herded through the streets. Because of the large amounts of animals traveling the streets, there was a lot of their waste. Animal waste was mostly left on the street although occasionally street sweepers would sweep it