4 ms·
No precedent within living memory is not the same as no precedent. Aside from 1918, the quarantine of entire cities and counties has been a common tactic to co
by ashtonkem 6y ago
No precedent within living memory is not the same as no precedent.
Aside from 1918, the quarantine of entire cities and counties has been a common tactic to control plagues from bubonic to yellow fever. There are even reports from the Black Death of some Italian cities delivering food to peasants to encourage them to stay home.
- noir_lord 6y agoNot to mention the draconian quarantine of merchant vessels entering/leaving ports. 30+ days mandatory quarantine wasn't unusual. The word Quarantine traces it's roots back to quarantino (40 days) and those laws where passed all over the place from (what we know) the 14th Century.
- ashtonkem 6y agoWith the expectation that if the ship is infected, everyone on it will die, and no medical help will be given. Pretty brutal by modern standards.
- ls612 6y agoNo precedent since the days of medicine being about the four humors of the body may as well be no precedent at all given how different the world is.
- ashtonkem 6y agoThat just isn’t true. Aside from the fact that 1918 wasn’t exactly the area of “four humors”, one can’t decide that “unprecedented” falls within a convenient range for your argument. Besides, if your argument is that precedent doesn’t exist because medical technology was different, consider that we’re dealing with exactly the problem that quarantine was designed to fix: an infectious disease that we neither have immunity nor treatment for. For this exact scenario, the precedent is both strong and relevant.