Rosen takes us on a chronological journey from the Greco-Roman ideas of health based on the balance of the four humors, through the plagues and quarantines of the Middle Ages, to the more modern era of political and industrial revolutions, and the health and sanitary reform movements of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Throughout, he displays his mastery of public health, his understanding of the social context as well as the biological determinants of disease, and his knowledge of social history, sociology, and political philosophy. Conceived in grand style and incorporating a wealth of detailed knowledge, the book is animated by the author¿s social and scientific optimism and his deep commitment to public health and progressive reform.Elizabeth Fee, from the foreword

Since publication in 1958, George Rosen¿s classic book has been regarded as the essential international history of public health. Describing the development of public health in classical Greece, imperial Rome, England, Europe, the United States, and elsewhere, Rosen illuminates the lives and contributions of the field¿s great figures. He considers such community health problems as infectious disease, water supply and sewage disposal, maternal and child health, nutrition, and occupational disease and injury. And he assesses the public health landscape of health education, public health administration, epidemiological theory, communicable disease control, medical care, statistics, public policy, and medical geography.

Rosen, writing in the 1950s, may have had good reason to believe that infectious diseases would soon be conquered. But as Dr. Pascal James Imperato writes in the new foreword to this edition, infectious disease remains a grave threat. Globalization, antibiotic resistance, and the emergence of new pathogens and the reemergence of old ones, have returned public health efforts to the basics: preventing and controlling chronic and communicable diseases and shoring up public health infrastructures that provide potable water, sewage disposal, sanitary environments, and safe food and drug supplies to populations around the globe.

A revised introduction by Elizabeth Fee frames the book within the context of the historiography of public health past, present, and future, and an updated bibliography by Edward T. Morman includes significant books on public health history published between 1958 and 2014. For seasoned professionals as well as students, A History of Public Health is visionary and essential reading.