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1908-2008 THE FIRST 100 YEARS: PRESBYTERIAN
The Care and Cure of Tuberculosis The Coopers came to Albuquerque because Hugh Cooper had tuberculosis (TB), the “white plague” of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Epidemiologists trace TB’s roots as far back as ancient Egypt. Mummies show evidence of infection. Epidemics rolled across Europe and Asia, killing thousands. The ubiquitous disease, called “consumption,” captured cultural imagination as victims wasted away with fever-brightened eyes and translucent, ethereal skin.
Above: Lord Byron on his Deathbed
Joseph-Denis Odevaere
circa 1826
Below: Unauthorized immigration
lodging, New York tenement Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-16348 photo by Jacob Riis
circa 1890
Tuberculosis was featured prominently on stage and screen. In the movies, Greta Garbo expired elegantly, sans coughing or spitting, in Robert Taylor’s arms, in Alexander Dumas’ Camille. Weaklunged beauties somehow belted out booming arias in operas such as La Boheme and La Traviata. Fashionable ladies applied white powder to imitate that pale “consumptive look.” The poet Lord Byron desperately desired to be borne away by TB, after languishing long in a moribund pallor. To his disappointment, he apparently succumbed to a banal common cold. Despite the drama, what caused the disease was anyone’s guess. Perhaps it was heredity, a weakness of character, a predisposing personality or body type, or a socioeconomic class—it did seem to be more prevalent among the crowded, impoverished apartment dwellers. Although no cure followed Dr. Robert Koch’s identification of the causative airborne bacillus in the 1880s, the rapid spread in teeming tenements was better understood. Improved knowledge led to quarantines and visiting nurse programs. Palliative treatment—outdoor air, absolute rest, a regimented schedule and robust diet seemed to save some. Grand, resort-like hospitals, catering to
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