Politics has infected discussion of the novel coronavirus, especially on social media. When Democratic Denver City Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca expressed solidarity with this tweet: “For the record, if I do get the coronavirus I’m attending every MAGA rally I can,” she received a swift rebuke. “The depths to which Democrats are sinking to politicize coronavirus is disgusting,” Republican National Committee Rapid Response Director Steve Guest responded. CdeBaca clarified her comment as sarcasm.
Given today’s polarized political climate and lack of impulse control on social media, it’s easy to assume that this is the first time politics has tainted a public health crisis. In fact, politics infected America’s first epidemic and cost lives.
“The yellow fever increases. The week before last about three a day died. This last week about 11 a day have died; consequently, from known data about 33 a day are taken, and there are about 330 patients under it,” Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson wrote to Congressman James Madison on Sept. 8, 1793, about the yellow fever epidemic infecting America’s capital city of Philadelphia. “They are much scattered through the town, and it is the opinion of the physicians that there is no possibility of stopping it, They agree it is a non-descript disease.”
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Jefferson’s political rival and fellow cabinet member, Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, had come down with it.
“I have myself been attacked with the reigning putrid fever, and with violence—but I trust that I am now completely out of danger. This I am to attribute, under God, to the skill and care of my friend Doctor Stevens, a gentleman lately from the island of St. Croix,” Hamilton wrote. He’d known Stevens from childhood when he lived in the Caribbean, where yellow fever was common.
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“His mode of treating the disorder varies essentially from that which has been generally practiced — And I am persuaded, where pursued, reduces it to one of little more than ordinary hazard,” Hamilton wrote, recommending Steven’s method.
“I know him so well … and being in my own person a witness to the efficacy of his plan, I venture to believe, that if adopted, and if the courage of the citizens can be roused, many lives will be saved, and much ill prevented,” he concluded, explaining that his wife had also caught the disease but was recovering by following Stevens’ method, which involved hydration, wine, baths, and herbs.
Hamilton’s recommendation was instantly political. How could a medical remedy become political and controversial? Stevens opposed the blood-purging method of Benjamin Rush, the city’s most prominent physician. Rush was a Republican proponent and friend of Jefferson’s.
Stevens’s method became the Federalist method for treating yellow fever and Rush’s became the Republican method. If you favored Hamilton’s Federalist politics you trust Stevens and chose staying clean, hydrated, and inhaling herbs. If you favored Jefferson, you chose Rush’s method and allowed leeches to suck the blood out of your body to supposedly purge the poison from your blood. Given what we now know about medicine, Stevens’s hygienic, homeopathic method was more effective. Rush was a failure.
Jefferson’s disdain of Hamilton also prevented him from expressing empathy for his rival. Instead, Jefferson spoke ill of the ill Hamilton in his letter to Madison.
“His family think him (Hamilton) in danger and he puts himself so by his excessive alarm. He had been miserable several days before from a firm persuasion he should catch it,” Jefferson wrote before insulting him and his military service. “A man as timid as he (Hamilton) is on the water, as timid on horseback, as timid in sickness, would be a phenomenon if the courage of which he has the reputation in military occasions were genuine.” He also questioned whether Hamilton truly had yellow fever. “His friends, who have not seen him, suspect it is only an autumnal fever he has.”
The first cases appeared in Philadelphia in early August 1793 not long after a ship arrived from Santo Domingo, where an earlier outbreak had occurred. It would take a hundred years before scientists discovered that mosquitoes transmitted yellow fever.
What stopped the 1793 epidemic? The change of seasons through the arrival of winter ended the epidemic. November’s cooler temperatures killed the mosquitoes that spread the disease.
Yellow fever took more than five thousand lives in 1793 in a city with more than fifty thousand people. Among them were John Todd and one of his two young sons, an infant named William. Todd’s wife, Dolley married Congressman Madison nearly a year later.
Choosing a medical treatment based on the politics of the doctor and his political friends seems ridiculous today. But let it be a cautionary tale of the importance of keeping politics out of an epidemic. Let the evidence, facts, and physicians lead the way.
JaneHamptonCook is the author of “America’s Star-Spangled Story” and “The Burning of the White House: James and Dolley Madison and the War of 1812.” She is a former White House webmaster for President George W. Bush.
Quebec legislature member Youri Chassin has announced he’s leaving the Coalition Avenir Québec government to sit as an Independent.
He announced the decision shortly after writing an open letter criticizing Premier François Legault’s government for abandoning its principles of smaller government.
In the letter published in Le Journal de Montréal and Le Journal de Québec, Chassin accused the party of falling back on what he called the old formula of throwing money at problems instead of looking to do things differently.
Chassin says public services are more fragile than ever, despite rising spending that pushed the province to a record $11-billion deficit projected in the last budget.
He is the second CAQ member to leave the party in a little more than one week, after economy and energy minister Pierre Fitzgibbon announced Sept. 4 he would leave because he lost motivation to do his job.
Chassin says he has no intention of joining another party and will instead sit as an Independent until the end of his term.
He has represented the Saint-Jérôme riding since the CAQ rose to power in 2018, but has not served in cabinet.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
MONTREAL – NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh says he will not be taking advice from Pierre Poilievre after the Conservative leader challenged him to bring down government.
“I say directly to Pierre Poilievre: I’m not going to listen to you,” said Singh on Wednesday, accusing Poilievre of wanting to take away dental-care coverage from Canadians, among other things.
“I’m not going to listen to your advice. You want to destroy people’s lives, I want to build up a brighter future.”
Earlier in the day, Poilievre challenged Singh to commit to voting non-confidence in the government, saying his party will force a vote in the House of Commons “at the earliest possibly opportunity.”
“I’m asking Jagmeet Singh and the NDP to commit unequivocally before Monday’s byelections: will they vote non-confidence to bring down the costly coalition and trigger a carbon tax election, or will Jagmeet Singh sell out Canadians again?” Poilievre said.
“It’s put up or shut up time for the NDP.”
While Singh rejected the idea he would ever listen to Poilievre, he did not say how the NDP would vote on a non-confidence motion.
“I’ve said on any vote, we’re going to look at the vote and we’ll make our decision. I’m not going to say our decision ahead of time,” he said.
Singh’s top adviser said on Tuesday the NDP leader is not particularly eager to trigger an election, even as the Conservatives challenge him to do just that.
Anne McGrath, Singh’s principal secretary, says there will be more volatility in Parliament and the odds of an early election have risen.
“I don’t think he is anxious to launch one, or chomping at the bit to have one, but it can happen,” she said in an interview.
New Democrat MPs are in a second day of meetings in Montreal as they nail down a plan for how to navigate the minority Parliament this fall.
The caucus retreat comes one week after Singh announced the party has left the supply-and-confidence agreement with the governing Liberals.
It’s also taking place in the very city where New Democrats are hoping to pick up a seat on Monday, when voters go to the polls in Montreal’s LaSalle—Émard—Verdun. A second byelection is being held that day in the Winnipeg riding of Elmwood—Transcona, where the NDP is hoping to hold onto a seat the Conservatives are also vying for.
While New Democrats are seeking to distance themselves from the Liberals, they don’t appear ready to trigger a general election.
Singh signalled on Tuesday that he will have more to say Wednesday about the party’s strategy for the upcoming sitting.
He is hoping to convince Canadians that his party can defeat the federal Conservatives, who have been riding high in the polls over the last year.
Singh has attacked Poilievre as someone who would bring back Harper-style cuts to programs that Canadians rely on, including the national dental-care program that was part of the supply-and-confidence agreement.
The Canadian Press has asked Poilievre’s office whether the Conservative leader intends to keep the program in place, if he forms government after the next election.
With the return of Parliament just days away, the NDP is also keeping in mind how other parties will look to capitalize on the new makeup of the House of Commons.
The Bloc Québécois has already indicated that it’s written up a list of demands for the Liberals in exchange for support on votes.
The next federal election must take place by October 2025 at the latest.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante is defending her decision to turn off comments on her social media accounts — with an announcement on social media.
She posted screenshots to X this morning of vulgar names she’s been called on the platform, and says comments on her posts for months have been dominated by insults, to the point that she decided to block them.
Montreal’s Opposition leader and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association have criticized Plante for limiting freedom of expression by restricting comments on her X and Instagram accounts.
They say elected officials who use social media should be willing to hear from constituents on those platforms.
However, Plante says some people may believe there is a fundamental right to call someone offensive names and to normalize violence online, but she disagrees.
Her statement on X is closed to comments.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
