Taking a deep breath

The need for fresh air, reported in the Manchester Guardian, July 31, 1844

The existence of large towns seems to be an essential condition of the present state of English civilisation. Every year sees a larger and larger proportion of our countrymen become inhabitants of towns; and there seems every probability that this increase of the civic, and comparative decrease of the rural population, will continue. Fully allowing that some great and evident advantages accompany this change, it would be absurd to close our eyes to the fact that the evils also are enormous. Among the most serious of these is the high rate of mortality in all our large towns.

If this be an unavoidable evil, we must submit to it with gallant resignation, however dreadful; but if, on the contrary, it really be at least in part removable, the wickedness of allowing it to continue is equalled only by its immeasurable folly.

If the rate of mortality in the following towns of Lancashire, namely Ashton, Bolton, Bury, Liverpool, Manchester, Oldham, Preston, Rochdale, Salford and Wigan, could be reduced to that of healthy localities, there would be a saving of between 10,000 and 11,000 lives a year, out of the 32,000 who now annually perish. It is believed that improved salubrity to this amount is really attainable, and that, too, by means easily within our reach.

What is the reason that three out of every hundred of the inhabitants of Manchester, for instance, perish every year, while, in healthy country districts, two only die out of the same number in the same period? Our fellow-townsmen are not worse fed, worse clothed, or worse lodged, than the generality of their countrymen, nor are their occupations more unhealthy; and yet three die where only two would in healthier districts!

The great differences between a country and a town life, as regards health, are that in the latter we breathe a less pure air, and enjoy fewer opportunities of healthful out-door exercise.The purity of the air is quite as important to our well-being as the wholesomeness of our food; indeed it is doubtful if it is not more so. All decomposing animal and vegetable matter gives out emanations which are absolutely poisonous, when concentrated; and always injurious, unless existing in exceeding small quantity.

We can easily perceive how it happens that one set of streets, which are narrow, built up at their ends, undrained, unpaved, and filthy, may have a rate of mortality twice as high as other streets, open, airy, clean, and dry, though they are in the very same neighbourhood, and are inhabited by the very same classes of people, with similar employments, and rates of wages. The one set of people are living in the midst of foul air and filth - for dirty streets imply dirty houses, dirty clothes, and dirty personal habits; the other are breathing an air comparatively pure. We need not then be surprised at the different results as to the health of their respective inhabitants.

· If you are interested in the history of the Guardian or the Observer, please refer to www.guardian.co.uk/newsroom for more information on the Newsroom, a purpose-built archive and visitor centre for the Guardian, the Observer and Guardian Unlimited at 60 Farringdon Road, London EC1R 3GA.