Opinion: Why we need a strong and independent public health service
President John Adams founded the U.S. Public Health Service in 1798 to protect U.S. citizens from epidemics. U.S. Marine Hospitals were strategically positioned at major port cities across the country because travelers spread disease. The U.S. Marine Hospital in Memphis (now a residential complex) was placed on the bluffs right above the port of Memphis precisely to prevent another yellow fever epidemic from devastating our city. (Lance Murphey/Daily Memphian file)
Jim Bailey
Jim Bailey is a physician, novelist, and community health advocate in Memphis.
“To deploy truly lifesaving public health care in this pandemic requires a spirit of self-government primarily motivated by love of neighbor and a sense of personal responsibility.”
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140 years after yellow fever, surprisingly little has changed
It was an early spring that year too – 1878 – as Mardi Gras celebrations in Memphis ended and news of yellow fever erupted. Even though the outbreak was in another country, ship trade made everyone our neighbor. And, Memphis was a major hub, webbed by train tracks and edged by riverboats.
The Essential Memphis Library: Molly Crosby’s ‘The American Plague’
In a month’s time, during the late summer of 1878, the city’s population plummeted from 50,000 to 20,000, with the vast majority of those remaining infected by the fever. Crosby's "The American Plague" takes you to this crucible moment in Memphis history, and helps explain what it meant.
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