Wikimedia Commons
Michigan reports the first two US deaths in a cyclosporiasis outbreak caused by a foodborne parasite Michigan health officials reported the first two US deaths tied to a nationwide cyclosporiasis outbreak, an intestinal illness caused by the microscopic parasite Cyclospora that spreads through contaminated food or water. The infection, marked by prolonged watery diarrhea, is not usually life-threatening, officials said. Investigators are working to trace the contaminated produce behind the outbreak. Analogies Leeuwenhoek discovers the 'little animals' teeming in a drop of water incredibly small; nay, so small, in my sight, that I judged that even if 100 of these very wee animals lay stretched out one against another, they could not reach the length of a grain of course sand; and if this be true, then ten hundred thousand of these living creatures could scarce equal the bulk of a course grain of sand
Antony van Leeuwenhoek, 'Observation… concerning little animals by him observed in rain-well-sea and snow water; as also in water wherein pepper had lain infused,' Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, vol. 12, 9 Oct. 1676 letter, English'd and published 25 March 1677 → John Snow maps cholera deaths to a single water pump On proceeding to the spot, I found that nearly all the deaths had taken place within a short distance of the pump.
John Snow, On the Mode of Communication of Cholera (2nd ed., London: John Churchill, 1855); John Snow Archive & Research Companion, Michigan State University → The infection 'propagated insensibly' by the unknowing the infection was propagated insensibly, and by such persons as were not visibly infected, who neither knew whom they infected or who they were infected by.
Daniel Defoe, A Journal of the Plague Year (1722), Project Gutenberg → Dr. Stockmann finds the town's healing waters 'full of infusoria' It proves the presence of decomposing organic matter in the water—it is full of infusoria. The water is absolutely dangerous to use, either internally or externally.
Henrik Ibsen, An Enemy of the People (1882), trans. R. Farquharson Sharp, Project Gutenberg → Monster Soup, Commonly Called Thames Water Heath's satirical etching magnifies a single drop of London drinking water into a swarming menagerie of writhing monsters. A genteel lady recoils, dropping her teacup in horror as she peers through a lens at the 'precious stuff' piped from the Thames. Decades before germ theory, the print made visible the invisible menace lurking in ordinary water, mocking a supply already fouled by sewage and, soon, cholera.
William Heath (as 'Paul Pry'), 'Monster Soup commonly called Thames Water, being a correct representation of that precious stuff doled out to us!!!', hand-coloured etching, c. 1828; Wellcome Collection → Death's Dispensary A hooded skeleton works the handle of a public water pump, doling out drink to the ragged poor and their children who crowd around with jugs and cups. Published during London's 1866 cholera epidemic, Pinwell's engraving turns the neighborhood well into an instrument of death, indicting the contaminated water supply that Snow's work had implicated. The everyday act of fetching water becomes a queue for the grave.
George John Pinwell, 'Death's Dispensary — Open to the Poor, Gratis, By Permission of the Parish', wood engraving, Fun magazine, 18 August 1866 → 
