How could something so terrible as an infectious disease that kills half its victims, and gruesomely, be so quickly relegated to the dustbins of history? Morris ventures a guess, actually several guesses. First, he says, people had expected that the terrifying epidemic would cause a massive social disruption. That did not, in the end, occur. And second, “there were no clear ‘lessons.’” The main effect of the epidemic on British society, he claims, was to spur the efforts of a group of public health researchers who were to prevail in implementing dramatically effective measures—like cleaning up
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