Cholera

Abstract

Cholera is a severe diarrheal illness caused by certain types of Vibrio cholerae, that can lead rapidly to dehydration and death. Although other organisms occasionally cause similar illness, the term cholera is reserved for illness caused by infection with toxigenic strains of V. cholerae O1 or O139, whether the symptoms are mild or severe. Epidemic cholera has appeared relatively recently on the global stage, spreading throughout the world early in the 19th century and causing severe epidemics in the crowded cities of the newly industrializing Europe. Epidemic cholera has since recurred in massive multicontinental pandemics. These pandemics had a profound impact on the development of public health, stimulating the establishment of standing health departments, ongoing infectious disease surveillance, and swift and effective public health response to epidemics. The discovery that cholera was associated with contaminated municipal drinking water spurred the sanitary revolution, leading to modern water and sewage treatment systems and the control of many diseases in the developed world. Now as then, epidemic cholera continues to goad countries in the early phases of industrialization to develop adequate water and sanitation infrastructures. © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2009.