What the Industrial Revolution Did For Us

Episode
Modern Medicine
Broadcast Info
2003 (29 mins)
Description
Series of 6 x 30 min programmes, presented by Dan Cruickshank.

As the Industrial Revolution began, medical practice was in the dark ages. Disease was rife and the average life expectancy was 36 years. Dan Cruickshank tells the amazing story of the pioneers of reason and science who challenged the old order: James Lind conducted the first clinical trial, proving that oranges and lemons could save the lives of thousands of sailors by preventing scurvy. Edward Jenner, a doctor preoccupied with beautiful milkmaids, used observation and lateral thinking to establish a vaccination against the killer disease, smallpox, and the desperately shy doctor Rene Laennec, wishing to avoid pressing his ear against the breasts of his female patients, invented that great symbol of the doctor and key instrument of diagnosis, the stethoscope.
But medical progress had a dark side. Anatomy was vital for knowledge about the workings of the human body. With only the corpses of executed prisoners available for dissection, medical researchers depended on body snatchers to give them subjects to work on. When the government decreed that the bodies of the poor should provide cadavers for the medical community it caused moral outrage, but medicine was awarded a new authority . Modern medicine began in the Industrial Revolution.
medical practice disease life expectancy Lind James clinical trials scurvy prevention Jenner Edward smallpox vaccination Laennec Rene stethoscope anatomy executed prisoners for dissection body snatchers
Genre
History; Design; Technology

How to cite this record

The Open University, "What the Industrial Revolution Did For Us". https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/ou/search/index.php/prog/6782 (Accessed 10 Jan 2025)