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Dictionary of Sydney

The Dictionary of Sydney
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Smallpox precautions in Bellevue Street, Surry ...

The Dictionary of Sydney was archived in 2021.

Smallpox precautions in Bellevue Street, Surry Hills 1881

Image courtesy of the

State Library of Victoria

[A/S02/07/81/221]

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Epidemics Smallpox epidemic 1881

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Epidemics Sanitation

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Smallpox epidemic 1881

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Surry Hills

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State Library of Victoria

The State Library of Victoria is contributing items from its multimedia collection

Epidemics

From the new European diseases that devastated Sydney's Aboriginal people in the eighteenth century, through subsequent epidemics of measles, scarlet fever, smallpox, influenza and HIV, Sydney has faced major threats from epidemic disease. Religion, media, and public health responses influenced the degree of panic and scapegoating that took place, though effective treatments were not in place until well into the twentieth century.

Smallpox epidemic 1881

Starting with a small Chinese child in The Rocks, the smallpox epidemic of 1881-82 had large consequences for the Chinese community who were further reviled and restricted and for the dozens of Sydneysiders quarantined for months at North Head. Despite the relative mildness of the outbreak, fear was rife, and the epidemic led to an overhaul of the colony's health regulations.

Epidemics

Sanitation

Smallpox epidemic 1881

Outbreak of one of the world's most feared diseases that led to big changes in public health administration in Sydney.

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Surry Hills

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Inner-city suburb located immediately to the south east of the central business district. After explosive growth in the second half of the nineteenth century it came to be seen as a slum, then experienced gentrification from the late 1960s.