Teen Newsletter: July 2020 – Your Future in Public Health

Undergraduate: You do not need to major in public health to apply for graduate level degrees. However, some universities and schools accredited by the Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH) offer a BS and/or BA in public health.

Graduate: The most common graduate degree is the MPH. Others include MHA, MS, and MHS.

More information about public health degrees. Here is an academic public health program finder. It lists CEPH-accredited schools along with very detailed areas of study.

During the June Zoom tour, you saw a photo of Typhoid Mary’s carrier card that will be displayed in the temporary Typhoid Land exhibit. Remember– it will be on display in the Lobby Gallery that currently houses Climate + Health. But who was Typhoid Mary? And what is a carrier card?

Mary Mallon, otherwise known as Typhoid Mary, was born in Ireland in 1869 and emigrated to the U.S. in the early 1880s. She was a cook in the New York City area in the early 1900s. Mallon was a healthy carrier of Salmonella typhi. As a result, she was unknowingly spreading typhoid fever to those around her, leaving many of them ill and unsure of the source of the disease. She was taken into custody in 1907 by local health officials when evidence showed that a number of typhoid cases in the area could be traced to kitchens where she worked. She was quarantined for three years in a cottage on North Brother Island, an island in New York City’s East River. She was released in 1910 on the condition that she never again work as a cook.

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A carrier card back then was a record of an asymptomatic disease that one had (carried), so Typhoid Mary had to have Salmonella typhi indicated on her carrier card.

About 5 years later, officials found that typhoid outbreaks were again traceable to kitchens where Mallon worked. She was then detained on North Brother Island until her death in 1938.

Want to learn more?

Check out the Smithsonian Magazine articles below.

This one makes connections to current events:
The Frightening Legacy of Typhoid Mary: With concerns about infectious disease in the news, a look back at history’s most famous carrier.

This one talks about North Brother Island, which is now a NY state park:
Exploring New York City’s Abandoned Island, Where Nature Has Taken Over: North Brother Island once housed Typhoid Mary, but now is an astonishing look at a world without humans

Here is more information about typhoid fever from the CDC.

Stay tuned for more “Out of the CDC Museum Collection” in the CDC Museum Public Health Academy Teen Newsletter.