It is five years since large parts of the world went into lockdown as Covid-19 swept the globe. It was the first pandemic in the modern era that resulted in an international co-ordinated response. Underlying this was a 21st-century understanding of health and disease. Importantly, internationally recognised bodies and NGOs whose sole purpose is to improve healthcare for people around the world also exist and were able to work together. The advances in medicine in recent years are just part of a long journey of humankind to understand our own bodies and how our wellbeing affects and is related to one another.

That journey has taken in mythology and misunderstanding as well as scientific development and common sense. Modern medicine and health awareness are now better understood in terms of people’s living conditions and local environment as well as through chemical and herbal interventions. The events of five years ago and the lasting legacy that Covid-19 has left in many people’s lives is part of our local, regional, national and global collective histories of medicine and health that are brought together when we mark World Health Day.

General resources:

• The development of the Department of Health (Historian article) – open access during April
• Disease and healthcare on the Isle of Man (Historian article)
• Losing sight of the glory: Five centuries of combat surgery (Historian article)
• Real Lives: Anna Wessels Williams (1863-1954) (Historian article)
• Podcast: Medieval Medicine – open access during April

Primary resources:

• Pandemics in history: similarity and difference (Primary History article) – open access during April 
• The history of medicine – warts and all – for KS2 (Primary History article)
• Happy 200th birthday Florence Nightingale! (Primary History article) 
• How We Used to Sleep  
• Podcast: Medieval Medicine – open access during April

Secondary resources:

• Continuity in the treatment of mental health through time (Teaching History article) – open access during April
• Health in the Middle Ages (Teaching History article)
• What Have Historians Been Arguing About... medieval science and medicine? (Teaching History article)
• Podcast: Medieval Medicine – open access during April