Typhoid Mary
by: Ana Plasencia
The Case of Mary Mallon in the book, Typhoid Mary, by Judith Walzer Leavitt, was not a unique case in the 1900s when all the epidemics began to break out. Mallon’s case was the first case that was researched and published so it became well known. The disease typhoid is a type of fever caused by Salmonella typhosa that plagues its victims with inflammation of the intestine and also causes ulcers; it is ingested through food and water. What was very unique to Mary Mallon, at that time, was that she showed no symptoms similar to these at any point in her life; she was a healthy carrier. A healthy carrier of typhoid had the disease in their system and could therefore pass it on to others but themselves not have any of the symptoms. In that specific time period, the idea of a healthy carrier was not supported with evidence and to many, such a thing did not exist.
Mary Mallon was born in 1869 and immigrated to New York as a teenager. She began to work as a cook in Long Island, New York in 1900. Families that she worked for always praised her for her culinary work and she quickly began getting jobs as a cook. Every new home that she worked at had a repeating pattern though; she would show up and shortly after someone, whether it was a servant or a family member would get sick, and no one suspected Mary because she was a healthy person. It all started in 1900 when Mary worked for her first family; she worked for the family for three years and sometime during the course of the time she was there, the family had a young male visitor and within 10 days he was infected with typhoid. The cause was found to be that he acquired typhoid elsewhere and already had typhoid when he entered the home. In the winter of 1901-1902 Mary cooked for a family in New York City and after one month of cooking for the family the laundress came down with typhoid; there was no investigation done for this case and Mary worked for that family for 11 months. Next in the summer of 1902 Mary worked in Dark Harbor, Maine and in the early summer, seven of the nine people in the household were infected with typhoid. The disease began with the footman and then infected the rest of the family; the only ones not affected were the father and Mary. The spreading of the disease was said to be linked to the footman because it began with him. In the summer of 1904, after nine months of working in another household, four servants were infected with typhoid, but since they lived separate than the family the family was not affected. The cause of the disease was linked to the laundress since she was the first to have typhoid. In the summer of 1906, the Oyster Bay case broke out where six out of the eleven people in the household were infected after just a few months of having employed Mary. The cause of the disease was said to be water contamination; it was said that the people that cleaned the water may have had typhoid excreta on their boots and contaminated the water. In the autumn of 1907, in Tuxedo Park, New York Mary was employed for only two weeks when the laundress fell ill and the cause was said to be unclear. Finally in the winter of 1907, after Mary worked in the household for 2 months, the chambermaid fell ill and then the disease spread to the daughter of the family who also falls ill and dies. During the period of 1900 and 1907, Mary infected 22 people without knowing she was cooking contaminated food.
The family that wished to rent the home after the Warren family, who were part of the Oyster Bay breakout of typhoid. They hired an investigator who specialized in epidemics and very much believed that there was such thing as a healthy carrier. The investigator was George Soper, who was a civil engineer and had a reputation for investigating cases such as this one. Soper began to analyze the Warren case, starting with how the disease spread and then looking at how typhoid usually breaks out.Typhoid is usually the result of contaminated water and/or food. Those causes were ruled out because Soper traced back how the food got into the home. Then Soper realized that the family had changed cooks right before the outbreak. This was his major clue. Soper sought ought to obtain urine, blood, and excrement samples from Mary but she was not cooperative. Mary did not believe that she had typhoid since she showed no symptoms and her doctors said that she was fine. Soper went to the court and presented all the evidence and obtained consent from the court to get bodily samples from Mary. Even when Soper had the consent from the court, Mary was not cooperative; she had to be forced to the hospital and then the samples were taken. When the excrement was analyzed, a large concentration on Typhoid bacilli was found and Mary was isolated. Mary was in isolation for two years before she sued for her release. She was granted the release on the condition that she would not cook anymore. Mary agreed and found other jobs; these jobs did not pay as much as cooking so she went back to cooking and was again put into isolation. Mary did not comprehend the severity of the situation she was in and she continued to infect people by not heeding to the requests asked of her by medical professionals. Mary Mallon died in isolation.
Typhoid fever was not the only epidemic during the 1900s, many epidemics such as smallpox, cholera, and yellow fever infected people living in the urban areas. The epidemics were so concentrated in this area because of the lack of proper sanitation. Sanitary laws as simple as washing of the hands before eating and after using the restroom began to be implemented after the discovery and wide spread knowledge of bacteria living everywhere. Policies such as all employees having to wash hands after using the restroom and requiring medical professionals to wash hands and change gloves between seeing patients really aided in stopping the spreading of disease. The story of Mary Mallon made the public aware that bacteria can be spread so easily and one can be infected without even knowing it.