Sanitation best medical innovation, says BMJ poll.

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MSNBC.com Poll: Greatest medical milestone? Sanitation beats discovery of DNA, anesthesia in worldwide survey Reuters Updated: 12:52 p.m. ET Jan. 18, 2007 LONDON - Sanitation was voted the most important medical milestone in the past century and a half on

Thursday in a poll conducted by a leading medical journal. Improved sewage disposal and clean water supply systems, which have reduced diseases such as cholera, was the overwhelming favorite of 11,341 people worldwide who voted in the survey conducted by the British Medical Journal. It surpassed antibiotics, the discovery of DNA, and anesthesia, which were among the top five milestones in the poll. Participants were asked what they thought was the biggest medical advance since the journal was established in 1840. “I’m delighted that sanitation is recognized by so many people as such an important milestone,” said Professor Johan Mackenbach, of Erasmus University Medical Center in Rotterdam who championed the sanitation choice. “The general lesson which still holds is that passive protection against health hazards is often the best way to improve population health,” he added. “Clearly, sanitation still plays a vital role in improving public health now and in the future,” he said. Other important milestones recommended for the top prize included the development of imaging techniques, the contraceptive pill, immunology and computers. London was one of first cities of modern times to seriously tackle the problem of poor sanitation after a British doctor, John Snow, discovered in 1854 that cholera was water-borne and not air-borne as had previously being thought. Copyright 2007 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16689654/ © 2007 MSNBC.com "When it comes to understanding disease process and the true nature of what a real healing process is, modern medicine sadly lingers in ignorance.

The pathetic thing is that this ignorance is promoted, fed and maintained by the profit motive. I realize that modern medicine is a business and not a healing art. Health and healing is bad for business." - Comment on a medical forum.

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[Guest guest]

In the book, " Medical Nemesis " , Ivan Illich(PhD), came to the same

conclusion(sanitation & hygeine). The book was written in the early

1970's. Paul Autrey

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- In , Jagannath Chatterjee

<jagchat01 wrote:

>

> MSNBC.com

>

> Poll: Greatest medical milestone?

> Sanitation beats discovery of DNA, anesthesia in worldwide survey

> Reuters

> Updated: 12:52 p.m. ET Jan. 18, 2007

>

>

> LONDON - Sanitation was voted the most important medical milestone

in the past century and a half on Thursday in a poll conducted by a

leading medical journal.