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Christopher Hamlin, PhD

The author is with the Department of History, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN.

Correspondence: Correspondence can be sent to Christopher Hamlin, PhD, Department of History, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556 (e-mail: chamlin{at}nd.edu). Reprints can be ordered at http://www.ajph.org by clicking on the "Reprints/Eprints" link.

It has been frequently claimed that cholera epidemics, both in the 19th century and today, were and can be the key stimulus for procurement of safe water and sanitation, an idea that I call "cholera forcing." "Technology forcing" refers to imposition of exogenous factors that suddenly make possible achievements that had not seemed so; cholera has been seen in this light. I argue that this view oversimplifies and underrepresents the importance of industrialization in securing water supplies. Careful study of the financial, political, and administrative foundations of such changes will be more fruitful.