Many people, possibly even most people by far, actually hold to several misunderstanding about health history. Indeed, modern medicine likes to promote these myths because they are good for marketing. They make modern medicine seem much more powerful, in the sense of being effective, than it actually is.

It isn't just the average Joe or Jane who are fooled. I distinctly recall many undergraduate and postgraduate students of the health professions who were misled. Perhaps they even wanted to believe the myths were true.

The classic errors involve reduced incidence of many once-common diseases, markedly lower infant mortality and the control of many infectious diseases. We should add the generally increased lifespan enjoyed by much of the western world.

The common error is to attribute these outcomes to the development of modern medicine. Specifically to the development of assorted pharmaceutical drugs, and classically to antibiotics, and to the development and use of vaccines.

The truth is very different indeed. Consider just the following for example.

• When doctors learned to wash their hands with soap and water before examining pregnant women (around 1850), disease rates among newborn babies fell dramatically.
• The Black Death (bubonic plague), which killed nearly half the people of western Europe during the Middle Ages, was eradicated not with drugs or vaccines but by meticulously getting rid of rats, which carried infected fleas.
• In modern times, good nutrition, regular bathing, and improved sewage disposal have proven more beneficial than vaccination in warding off measles, rubella, and diphtheria in children.

The fact is that health has been dramatically improved on a vast scale, not by drugs or by vaccines. The real credit belongs to sound public health measures. It is personal and public hygiene practices along with improved nutrition and safe water supplies that should be credited.