MHS-2410 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Sexually Transmitted Infection, Social Hygiene Movement, Victorian Morality
4 Nov 2016
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Document Summary
Generally infectious diseases are under control due to medical advances, rising standard of living, better nutrition and natural changes in the host-parasite relationship. Venereal diseases have engaged certain attitudes and values. Beliefs about their causes and consequences affect response to the problem. The social history of venereal diseases reveals major trends in the development of modern medicine. Magic bullet: specific treatments to root out and destroy infectious organisms. In this sense, social context and environmental phenomena were discounted as causes for a disease. Social construction of venereal diseases: the particular symbols that american society came to associate with these diseases and their victims. The symbols reflect social values, patterns of judgment of what is good or bad. Medicine is not just affected by social, economic and political values - it is embedded in them. Since the late nineteenth century, vd was used as a symbol of pollution and contamination.
