{"id":261121,"date":"2025-10-29T11:00:19","date_gmt":"2025-10-29T11:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/?post_type=snippet&p=261121"},"modified":"2025-10-28T12:39:15","modified_gmt":"2025-10-28T12:39:15","slug":"the-real-john-snow","status":"publish","type":"snippet","link":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/snippet\/the-real-john-snow\/","title":{"rendered":"The real John Snow"},"content":{"rendered":"

Remember him? Not the news broadcaster or the Game of Thrones character, the London doctor who in 1854 identified the source of a Soho cholera epidemic as the local water supply. Though his work was contested for years, it’s now regarded as the ‘founding event of the science of epidemiology<\/a>‘. Vaccines soon followed, making cholera history.<\/p>\n

Except they didn’t. Cholera is once again rocketing<\/a>, in 34 countries, mostly because of ‘poverty, inequality, conflict and displacement,’ and also ‘because the disease afflicts almost exclusively the poorest countries and communities, [so] the vaccine does not attract investment from developers, for whom it offers little market opportunity.’<\/p>\n

Can’t pay? Die of cholera. John Snow would be turning in his grave.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"template":"","class_list":["post-261121","snippet","type-snippet","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/snippet\/261121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/snippet"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/snippet"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldsocialism.org\/spgb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=261121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}