In 1900, for instance, the leading causes of death per 100,000 patients were pneumonia and flu, followed by tuberculosis and gastrointestinal infection. Heart disease and cancer were well down the list. A century earlier, the first publication of The New England Journal of Medicine in the early 1800s lists a study of causes of death that includes 942 patients, nearly a third of whom died from consumption. Almost 50 deaths were stillborns, slightly fewer succumbed to typhus, only 5 had cancer, and a single patient, who, well, medicine could do little about, was struck by lightning.
