Reference no: EM133617102

Assignment: Disease, Poverty, and Power

Instructions: Cholera and tuberculosis were both diseases that were associated with poverty in the late nineteenth century, and the ways in which governments, physicians, and public health officials responded to these diseases often exposed differences between the urban working class and the middle class and between people of European ancestry and people of color. In a 1000 words essay, discussion the following:

Question A. In what ways did nineteenth-century cholera epidemics expose differences and/or cause conflict between the poor and the middle class (bourgeoisie)? In what ways were cholera outbreaks in the nineteenth century related to outbreaks of social unrest? How did government efforts to prevent cholera epidemics sometimes harm the poor?

Question B. To what did white physicians and public health officials attribute higher rates of tuberculosis infection among African Americans in the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth? How did white Americans respond to people of color who were infected with tuberculosis? How did this response reflect and reinforce pre-existing divisions of power?

Question C. Did any of the efforts of national, state, or local governments during the recent Covid-19 pandemic hurt the poor more than they did the middle class?

Question D. Have you ever felt that your access to healthcare or your ability to remain healthy has been adversely affected by your race, ethnicity, sex, or socioeconomic class?