Abigail Woods

A Manufactured Plague : The History of Foot-and-mouth Disease in Britain

Introduction * Foot and Mouth Disease in 19th-century Britain: From Everyday Ailment to Animal Plague * The Politics of Plague: Home Rule for Ireland, 1912-1923 * The Epidemics of 1922-1924 * Effects on the Anglo-Argentine Meat Trade, 1924-1939 * The Science, 1912-1958 * The 1951-1952 Vaccination Controversy * The 1967-1968 Epidemic * Foot and Mouth Disease, 2001 * Conclusion: Foot and Mouth Disease in Britain, 1839-2001 - Lessons Learned? * Notes * References * Index

From cruelty to welfare: The emergence of farm animal welfare in Britain, 1964-71

There is a long history of concern in Britain for how animals are treated. Until the 1960s, these concerns were expressed largely in terms of cruelty or suffering, which was prevented through various acts of Parliament. Over the period 1964-71, amidst public debates about intensive farming, a new discourse of animal welfare emerged. To understand what welfare meant and how it became established as a term, a concept and a target of government regulation, it is necessary to examine farming politics and practices, the existing tradition of animal protection and attempts to rethink the nature of animal suffering.

A historical synopsis of farm animal disease and public policy in twentieth century Britain

The diseases suffered by British livestock, and the ways in which they were perceived and managed by farmers, vets and the state, changed considerably over the course of the twentieth century. This paper documents and analyses these changes in relation to the development of public policy. It reveals that scientific knowledge and disease demographics cannot by themselves explain the shifting boundaries of state responsibility for animal health, the diseases targeted and the preferred modes of intervention. Policies were shaped also by concerns over food security and the publics health, the state of the national and livestock economy, the interests and expertise of the veterinary profession, and prevailing agricultural policy. This paper demonstrates how, by precipitating changes to farming and trading practices, public policy could sometimes actually undermine farm animal health. Animal disease can therefore be viewed both as a stimulus to, and a consequence of, twentieth century public policy.

One health, many histories

In another of Veterinary Records series of articles on One Health, Abigail Woods and Michael Bresalier discuss the complex history of veterinary-medical collaboration and highlight the social, political and institutional factors that have contributed towards shaping the One Health model

One Health in history.

The One Health concept of combined veterinary and human health continues to gain momentum, but the supporting literature is sparse. In this book, the origins of the concept are examined and practical content on methodological tools, data gathering, monitoring techniques, study designs, and mathematical models is included. Zoonotic diseases, with discussions of diseases of wildlife, farm animals, domestic pets and humans, and real-world issues such as sanitation, economics, food security and evaluating the success of vaccination programmes are covered in detail. Discussing how to put policy into practice, and with case studies throughout, this book combines research and practice in one broad-ranging volume.

Little, if at all, removed from the illiterate farrier or cow-leech: the English veterinary surgeon, c.1860-1885, and the campaign for veterinary reform.

Faced with changes to its composition and the society it serves, the British veterinary profession is currently engaged in the difficult task of assessing whether its structure, expertise and governance are still fit for purpose.1 Its transition from a male to a female-dominated profession; the growing importance of pet medicine; and the decline of agriculture and state veterinary medicine, are forcing vets to reconsider their roles, identities, priorities and relationships. However, this is not the first time that vets have addressed such issues. Long desirous of improving their status and income, yet forced to compete for patients within a society whose valuation of animals has shifted over time, their history has been punctuated by recurrent episodes of self-evaluation and reform.2 This paper focuses on one late-nineteenth-century episode. The occupation of veterinary surgeon was then well established, its origins dating from the 1791 foundation of the Royal Veterinary College (RVC), London. A second school in Edinburgh had been opened by William Dick in 1828 with the support of the Highland and Agricultural Society (HAS), and a corporate body, the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS), established by Royal Charter in 1844.3 However, all was not well. During the 1860s and 1870s, leading vets complained repeatedly that their utility to agriculture and the nation was overlooked, and that their social status was unjustifiably lower than that of the “sister profession”, medicine. They were also extremely concerned by the increasing numbers of unqualified individuals who were assuming the title “veterinary surgeon”, and sought ways of managing this threat whilst simultaneously advancing their own prospects. Their efforts form the subject of two historical accounts, which examine the RCVSs failed attempts to gain a legal injunction against unqualified practice in 1866. Iain Pattison attributed this outcome to veterinary politics and personalities, blaming William Dick and his supporters, who selfishly refused to support any initiative emanating from the London-based RCVS. John Fisher emphasized a different factor: vets were “not quite a profession”. Their competence was not demonstrably greater than that of unqualified vets, and they did not possess the specialized knowledge that would have justified the award of a market monopoly. The reason for this state of affairs lay in the marketplace. In the absence of a public veterinary role, most vets worked in private practice. Their potential earnings did not warrant a substantial investment in formal education; therefore college courses were brief and superficial, so producing qualified vets of questionable competence.4 In subsequent years, these difficulties were tackled. In line with “trait based” sociological models of professionalization,5 authors emphasize improvements in education, which made vets more expert; advances in regulation, whereby rifts were healed and the RCVS became a single portal of entry to the profession; and the granting of legal monopolies to qualified vets via the 1878 Contagious Diseases of Animals Act—which required all local authorities to appoint at least one qualified veterinary inspector—and the 1881 Veterinary Surgeons Act, which granted qualified vets the exclusive right to the title “veterinary surgeon”. In accordance with their broader interpretative frameworks, Pattison attributed such developments to the actions of far-sighted individuals, while for Fisher it was the creation (during the 1865–7 cattle plague epidemic) and expansion of new market opportunities in the public control of contagious animal diseases that drove improvements in education, expertise and legal status.6 One problem with these accounts is their retrospective construction of late-nineteenth-century vets as a “profession in waiting” whose advancement depended on the healing of rifts (Pattison) or the realization of a potential market (Fisher). This approach is open to question in the light of a recent body of literature that has problematized the definition of a “profession”, challenged its presumed trajectory of development and reconceptualized the relationships between professionals and amateurs.7 In adopting a teleological perspective, authors have failed to examine alternative visions of veterinary progress, or veterinary commercial activities that have no present-day parallel. They consider unqualified veterinary practice not on its own terms, but as an impediment to be overcome. They have also tended to assume rather than analyse the impacts of educational, regulatory and legislative reforms. Consequently, we believe it is time to take a fresh look at later nineteenth-century vets, starting with some fundamental questions: who were the vets and what did they do? What expertise and identities did they possess, and how did they relate to society and to each other?8 We do not claim to be the first to address such issues;9 nor do we provide a comprehensive analysis. Nevertheless, by drawing on novel source material and adopting a symmetrical approach to qualified and unqualified vets we offer insights and perspectives that go well beyond the existing literature. Using evidence from veterinary journals, directories, registers, casebooks and bills, we reveal that vets were a disparate and expanding group of individuals. Operating within a highly competitive climate, and facing different challenges in urban and rural locations, they aimed to make at least a partial living from animal healing. Some were qualified and some not, but in terms of their education, expertise, employment and social status, there was considerable overlap between the two groups.10 Against this backdrop, we reconsider late-nineteenth-century attempts by leaders of the RCVS to enhance the status and competence of its members and to abolish unqualified veterinary practice. Rejecting the notion that they were deliberately trying to achieve a pre-defined set of professional characteristics, we ask, instead, what they thought they were doing. We argue that while all wished for social and economic advancement, and felt that distinguishing themselves from unqualified vets was essential in this regard, the actual means of achieving these goals were far from clear. In a rapidly changing society, veterinary surgery stood at a cross-roads. Should it seek to join medicine as a learned, scientific profession, bound by gentlemanly modes of conduct, or did advancement depend upon a more practical, businesslike orientation? Was self-improvement sufficient to convince society that qualified vets were superior to unqualified, or was a legal monopoly required? After briefly exploring these issues, we conclude that the process of veterinary reform was both contingent and contested, and that its outcomes fell far short of reformers’ expectations.

Recapturing the history of surgical practice through simulation-based re-enactment

This paper introduces simulation-based re-enactment (SBR) as a novel method of documenting and studying the recent history of surgical practice. SBR aims to capture ways of surgical working that remain within living memory but have been superseded due to technical advances and changes in working patterns. Inspired by broader efforts in historical re-enactment and the use of simulation within surgical education, SBR seeks to overcome some of the weaknesses associated with text-based, surgeon-centred approaches to the history of surgery. The paper describes how we applied SBR to a previously common operation that is now rarely performed due to the introduction of keyhole surgery: open cholecystectomy or removal of the gall bladder. Key aspects of a 1980s operating theatre were recreated, and retired surgical teams (comprising surgeon, anaesthetist and theatre nurse) invited to re-enact, and educate surgical trainees in this procedure. Video recording, supplemented by pre- and post-re-enactment interviews, enabled the teams’ conduct of this operation to be placed on the historical record. These recordings were then used to derive insights into the social and technical nature of surgical expertise, its distribution throughout the surgical team, and the members’ tacit and frequently sub-conscious ways of working. While acknowledging some of the limitations of SBR, we argue that its utility to historians – as well as surgeons – merits its more extensive application.

Bringing surgical history to life.

Roger Kneebone and Abigail Woods describe how a surgeon and a medical historian set out to capture a disappearing world

Between Human and Veterinary Medicine: The History of Animals and Surgery

This chapter opens by describing some of the historical features of animal surgery and the methodological issues that arise in its investigation. It defines the terms ‘animal’ and ‘surgery’ and identifies the two key roles in which animals occur in surgery: as surgical patients and experimental material. The historical development of these roles will be reviewed, with an emphasis on modern, western contexts. Two key themes will be emphasized throughout: the co-constitution of animal surgery and human–animal relations, and the historical connections between the surgery of animal patients, experimental animals and human patients. The chapter concludes by discussing the need for further research on how animal surgery was practiced, and identifies important research questions and the historical sources and approaches that could be used to address them.

Introduction: Centring Animals Within Medical History

This chapter lays down the volume’s aims and objectives: to make a programmatic contribution to the field of medical history by elucidating some of the largely unrecognised ways in which animals informed the knowledges, practices and social formations of medicine; to enhance the burgeoning field of animal history by offering the first substantive account of animals within medicine that goes beyond the much-studied context of the laboratory; and to provide a history of, and critical reflections on the present-day agenda known as One Health. It introduces the field of animal history for the benefit of medical historians who may not be familiar with this scholarship, and draws from it to explain the volume’s core concepts, approaches and cross-cutting themes.