Rudolf Virchow, public health, and the built environment.

Abstract

features a number of articles on the relation-ship between human health and the built environment (e.g., neighborhood condi-tions, housing, etc.). It also presents articles that underscore the increasing impor-tance that public health departments need to place on social and behavioral sciencein their program development. Taken together, these articles clearly demonstrate howfar urban and public health thinking has moved beyond “mains and drains” and“bugs and drugs.” There has been a growing recognition over the past several de-cades that “health exists in the context of social, environmental, community, reli-gious, political and other spheres” (Cohen and Perl, this issue).Of course, this is nothing new. No better example exists than Dr. Rudolf Vir-chow (1821–1902), the founder of modern pathology and one of the most brilliantmedical minds of the 19th century. In 1845, Virchow published a classic treatise onthrombosis and haematosis, describing the earliest reported case of leukemia. Amongnumerous other accomplishments, he discovered neuroglia, gliomas, giant cells, andthe amino acids leucine and tyrosine.In 1848, the Prussian government sent Virchow to investigate an outbreak oftyphus among weavers in Upper Silesia (now part of Poland). Rather than develop-ing a set of proposals based on his belief in cellular dysfunction, Virchow startledthe government in Berlin with the following recommendations to prevent futureepidemics