The author likely set up the text to contrast the deaths in the First Clinic with the deaths in the Second Clinic to show the logical process Semmelweis used to solve the problem. By highlighting the stark difference in death rates between the two clinics, the author illustrates the urgency and importance of understanding the underlying causes of childbed fever, leading Semmelweis to investigate and ultimately recognize the crucial role of hygiene in reducing mortality.
"1847: Wash Your Hands"
by Marguerite Vigliani, MD; Gale Eaton
Ignatz Semmelweis was appalled. The Vienna hospital where he worked was world famous for its obstetrics department, ' but women would rather give birth outside on the street It was safer?
Inside, more of them died of childbed fever, especially if they were put in First Clinic. The two maternity wards or clinics accepted patients on altemate days, but whenever their babies arrived, mothers begged to be put in Second Clinic. The death rate there was lower 3
Childbed (or puerperal) fever was a bacterial infection common in nineteenth-century hospitals and even after doctor-assisted home births. It tore through the reproductive systems and blood streams of women exhausted by childbirth. In America, oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. announced in 1843 that the disease was carried on the unwashed hands and clothes of doctors, but he
was largely ignored 4
In 1847, Semmelweis came to the same conclusion. As assistant In Professor lohann Klein he was nut in charde of First Clinic:
Use the passages to answer the question.
Why might the author have set up the text to contrast the deaths in the First Clinic with the deaths in the Second Clinic?
(1 point)
to show how the staffing at each was alike, which highlights the confusion about why one had more deaths than the other
• to show how difficult the epidemic was to solve
to give information about the qualifications of the staff at each clinic, and how this was a major clue to the solution of the epidemic
to show the logical process Semmelweis used to solve the problem
1 answer