Did Somebody Whisper “Cholera”?
There are lots of interesting things to learn in Valencia or in any city if you walk around looking above street level. One thing you learn is how to apologise after bumping into the 20th person.
Often the most interesting sights, especially architectural sights, are to be found looking up.
If, for example, I hadn’t looked up at a building in Calle Pasqual y Genis, I might never have discovered the story of Jaume Ferran i Clua.
Although he wasn’t Valencia, Ferran i Clua played a vital part in the history of Valencia in the dark old days when cholera used to sweep through the population like a knife through hot butter.
In 1885 he was called to Valencia, where he set up his lab in the house that now bears a plaque to honour his work, and set about innoculating people with a vaccination of his own invention. So successful were the results that politicians and the medical establishment condemned his work and methods.
The worst of that epidemia took place in Alcira, where Ferran started vaccinating on the 24th of April. 11,000 of the population of 16,000 were vaccinated and of those 11,000 only 15 died, whereas 206 of the remaining 5,000 perished.
Ferran’s work was better appreciated abroad, where his efforts were praised by pioneering scientists such as Louis Pasteur.
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