GOVERNAMENTAL MEASURES IN THE HEALTH CRISIS OF 1803-1805

Abstract

The production crisis of 1803-1805 ushered in many cases of malaria fevers, exacerbated by the poverty of the rural world. This paper aims at approaching the measures of relief for the poor and the sick by analysing the requests for help files addressed to the Consejo de Castilla.The government acted following a twofold line: on the one hand to relieve the sick by supplying quinine and resorting to the sopa econamica, and on the other by promoting public works in order to employ the unemployed day labourers. Local authorities suddenly realized their villages' dreadful hygienic situations and started a campaign of building fountains and draining stagnant waters. The overall result was very limited owing to the scarcity of funds available, because the whole economic burden was to lay on the village councils. Carrying out these works the villages subsequently became poorer because they had to resort to selling community property or to loans that would have been repaid later.