History of Medicine

Status: draft · Confidence: low (0.36) · Basis: verified_sources

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## TL;DR

Medicine's evolution: ancient (Hippocrates: disease natural not supernatural, ~400 BCE) → Galen (anatomy via animals, errors persisted 1500 years) → Vesalius (human dissection, 1543) → germ theory (Pasteur, Koch, 1860s-80s) → anesthesia (1846, Morton) → antiseptics (Lister, 1867) → antibiotics (Fleming: penicillin, 1928) → modern medicine.

## Core Explanation

Germ theory (Pasteur 1861): microorganisms cause disease — single most important medical breakthrough. Before: miasma theory (bad air). Handwashing (Semmelweis, 1847): reduced maternal mortality from 18% to 2% — doctors rejected him, he died in asylum. Smallpox eradication (1980): only human disease eradicated — vaccination (Jenner, 1796). CRISPR gene editing (2012): possible cures for genetic diseases.

## Further Reading

- [The Emperor of All Maladies (Siddhartha Mukherjee)](https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Emperor-of-All-Maladies/Siddhartha-Mukherjee/9781439170915)

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