The Environment and Diseases of Yantai from 1820 to 1912

There was plague everywhere in the history and it brought grave disaster. In late Qing dynasty, the society of Yantai was experiencing a sharp transformation, while the epidemic ran more and more rampant in this period. The plague is the result of comprehensive action of natural and social environment, it reflects the variance of ecology, vice versa it affects local social system. The frequent occurrence of plague, people ,whether in the cities or rural areas, couldn't avoid its influence, the only way t o solve the problem of plague was to develop the public health business. Public-health,different from personal hygiene, means health problems relate to public-health, mainly refers to through the whole society's joint effort to improve public sanitation, public water sanitation, public food hygiene, popularize the personal hygiene knowledge, promote the development of health care and prevention and treatment of infectious diseases. Although Yantai was the first port in Shandong Province that opened to foreign countries,due to the long-term municipal management were not unified, the development of Yantai's public-health construction was very slow, far behind the other cities that opened the port.The main text is made up of three parts, the first part: Through all kinds of historical records, restitute the environment of Yantai's infectious diseases prevailed、the urban construction at the early time when Yantai opened the port、the population's distribution、the density of population、house construction、street programming、source of drinking water、waste disposal、sewage treatment、manure treatment、hospital distribution of Yantai city, and the people's economic situation and health concepts, contrast with each other, come to the conclusion that: since the sanitary condition of Chinese people's residential area was very bad, and people do not pay attention to environmental health, Yantai was easily attacked by infectious disease.The second part: Clean up the records of diseases in Yantai's chorography and China Customs Medical Reports, restitute the situation of prevalence of diseases in Yantai, the diseases recorded in Yantai's chorographies were mainly cholera、 diphtheria、hepatitis、dysentery and plague,the most serious epidemic was cholera. The infectious diseases in Yantai city included cholera, diphtheria, smallpox, measles, dysentery, malaria, typhoid, influenza, scarlet fever and so on.. However, most of the time, these diseases only had several cases or brokeout in a small scale, and seldom prevailed widely.The third part: Discribe the positive influence of foreigners to the development of Yantai's public-health, as well as China's officials and businessmen's contribution to the development of Yantai's public-health, Yantai's public-health made some progress under the influence of both Chinese and foreigners, the appearance of the city had changed a little. However, due to the lack of a unified long-term planning and management, Yantai's public-health was still very backward, and a number of important urban facilities were still not built. After the foundation of new China, Yantai's public-health was able to develop rapidly.