The Impact of Public Health Initiatives on US Tuberculosis Death Rates, 1880-1917
This site showcases how spatial analysis, especially temporal heat maps, are beneficial, if not integral, to exploring the impact of public health initiatives on contagion death rates. This project specifically examined the influence of public and private sanatoriums on tuberculosis death rates in the United States from 1880-1917. The goal for this project was to see if the establishment of sanatoriums, built to isolate and hopefully cure tuberculosis before the antibiotic existed, correlated with a decrease in the tuberculosis death rate. The final temporal heat map reveals that the building of isolated spaces for tuberculous patients did not always parallel a decreasing mortality. For example, in California the death rate did not change from 1890-1910 with the opening of public and private sanatoriums. The death rate was static, and, therefore, sanatorium construction had no real impact until after 1911. However, I created an interactive map for you to explore the information and make your own conclusions.
To navigate the site, please click through the tabs above. If you want to follow this project's development, click through the tabs successively. This page introduces the project as a whole and my resulting argument. The Tuberculosis page contextualizes the disease in the 19th-20th centuries and gives information about tuberculosis itself. It also details specific public health initiatives enacted by various governmental bodies and private organizations. The Research page showcases my primary and secondary sources, data, and how I utilized that information in conjunction with digital tools. The Results and Analysis page highlights the final, temporal heat map that resulted from the data and provides my analysis. It also provides the interactive heat map. The About page gives the reader more information on myself, contact info, and the inception of this project. Please feel free to view each page as its own if you wish. For example, if you just want to learn more about how I integrated digital tools into historical research and scholarship, just view the Research page.