Medicine & Disease

Sarah Wise’s The Undesirables: The Law that Locked Away a Generation lays bare the cruelty and injustice of the Mental Deficiency Act of 1913.

When it was first named in 17th-century Switzerland, nostalgia was a very real – and very dangerous – disease.

To support ex-servicemen injured during the First World War, charities like St Dunstan’s found creative ways of fundraising. 

For centuries, scientists and philosophers used phantom limbs to unravel the secrets of the human mind. While we know phantom pain exists, we still don’t know why.

There is an enduring obsession with understanding the body and mind of Henry VIII, but how sound are diagnoses past and present – and do we need them?

Repulsive revelations of bodily infestations were viewed by some in medieval Europe as proof of sanctity. But for most, parasites were just plain disgusting.

Eminent doctors and notorious charlatans vied for sick patients to treat in the cut-throat medical marketplace of Georgian England.

In Republican China, amid the chaos of dynastic collapse and war, opium became a rare stable currency, yielding huge riches for those who knew how to work the system.

Though often constrained by limited medical knowledge, 18th-century communities offered practical and emotional support to those experiencing mental distress.