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A box, a trough and marbles: How the Reed-Frost epidemic theory shaped epidemiological reasoning in the 20th century

The article takes the renewed popularity and interest in epidemiological modelling for Covid-19 as a point of departure to ask how modelling has historically shaped epidemiological reasoning. The focus lies on a particular model, developed in the late 1920s through a collaboration of the former fiel...

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Autor principal: Engelmann, Lukas
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Springer International Publishing 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8404547/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34462807
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40656-021-00445-z
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author Engelmann, Lukas
author_facet Engelmann, Lukas
author_sort Engelmann, Lukas
collection PubMed
description The article takes the renewed popularity and interest in epidemiological modelling for Covid-19 as a point of departure to ask how modelling has historically shaped epidemiological reasoning. The focus lies on a particular model, developed in the late 1920s through a collaboration of the former field-epidemiologists and medical officer, Wade Hampton Frost, and the biostatistician and population ecologist Lowell Reed. Other than former approaches to epidemic theory in mathematical formula, the Reed-Frost epidemic theory was materialised in a simple mechanical analogue: a box with coloured marbles and a wooden trough. The article reconstructs how the introduction of this mechanical model has reshaped epidemiological reasoning by shifting the field from purely descriptive to analytical practices. It was not incidental that the history of this model coincided with the foundation of epidemiology as an academic discipline, as it valorised and institutionalised new theoretical contributions to the field. Through its versatility, the model shifted the field’s focus from mono-causal explanations informed by bacteriology, eugenics or sanitary perspectives towards the systematic consideration of epidemics as a set of interdependent and dynamic variables.
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spelling pubmed-84045472021-08-30 A box, a trough and marbles: How the Reed-Frost epidemic theory shaped epidemiological reasoning in the 20th century Engelmann, Lukas Hist Philos Life Sci Original Paper The article takes the renewed popularity and interest in epidemiological modelling for Covid-19 as a point of departure to ask how modelling has historically shaped epidemiological reasoning. The focus lies on a particular model, developed in the late 1920s through a collaboration of the former field-epidemiologists and medical officer, Wade Hampton Frost, and the biostatistician and population ecologist Lowell Reed. Other than former approaches to epidemic theory in mathematical formula, the Reed-Frost epidemic theory was materialised in a simple mechanical analogue: a box with coloured marbles and a wooden trough. The article reconstructs how the introduction of this mechanical model has reshaped epidemiological reasoning by shifting the field from purely descriptive to analytical practices. It was not incidental that the history of this model coincided with the foundation of epidemiology as an academic discipline, as it valorised and institutionalised new theoretical contributions to the field. Through its versatility, the model shifted the field’s focus from mono-causal explanations informed by bacteriology, eugenics or sanitary perspectives towards the systematic consideration of epidemics as a set of interdependent and dynamic variables. Springer International Publishing 2021-08-30 2021 /pmc/articles/PMC8404547/ /pubmed/34462807 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40656-021-00445-z Text en © The Author(s) 2021 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) .
spellingShingle Original Paper
Engelmann, Lukas
A box, a trough and marbles: How the Reed-Frost epidemic theory shaped epidemiological reasoning in the 20th century
title A box, a trough and marbles: How the Reed-Frost epidemic theory shaped epidemiological reasoning in the 20th century
title_full A box, a trough and marbles: How the Reed-Frost epidemic theory shaped epidemiological reasoning in the 20th century
title_fullStr A box, a trough and marbles: How the Reed-Frost epidemic theory shaped epidemiological reasoning in the 20th century
title_full_unstemmed A box, a trough and marbles: How the Reed-Frost epidemic theory shaped epidemiological reasoning in the 20th century
title_short A box, a trough and marbles: How the Reed-Frost epidemic theory shaped epidemiological reasoning in the 20th century
title_sort box, a trough and marbles: how the reed-frost epidemic theory shaped epidemiological reasoning in the 20th century
topic Original Paper
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8404547/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34462807
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40656-021-00445-z
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