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THE MOST FEARED DISEASE OF THE 19TH CENTURY

                  The year was 1854, and London was in the grip of yet another outbreak of cholera –an intestinal ailment characterized by severe diarrhea and dehydration. The disease struck with alarming speed. Many who awoke in good health were dead by nightfall. There was no known cure. It was the most feared disease of the century, and the cause remained a mystery. Some thought cholera was contracted by inhaling offensive odors from decaying organic matter. Their suspicions were understandable. The River Thames, which coursed through London, emitted a horrible stench. Did the foul-smelling air carry the disease? Five years earlier, a physician named John Snow had suggested that cholera was caused, not by contaminated air, but by contaminated water. Another physician, William Budd, believed that a funguslike living organism carried the disease. During the 1854 epidemic, Snow tested his theory by studying the lives of those who had contracted cholera in the Lond