Doctors at the Borders: Immigration and the Rise of Public Health

Commendation Quotes: "In this era of globalization and severe public health threats and challenges, Dr. Michael LeMay raises an extremely timely issue: how to accommodate large-scale migration with its myriad benefits, while stemming public health threats and treating immigrants who may be carrying deadly and contagious diseases. "Doctors at the Borders: Immigration and the Rise of Public Health" takes as its reference point the courageous work of medical professionals in the quarantine stations at Ellis Island, Angel Island, and New Orleans, who fought the spread of bubonic plague, Spanish influenza, small pox, and other deadly diseases and viruses, saving untold lives in the process and contributing substantially to the emergence of public health procedures and public health as a field of medical practice."Biographical Note: Michael C. LeMay, PhD, is professor emeritus of political science at California State University-San Bernardino (CSUSB), CA. Brief Description: "A unique resource for the general public and students interested in immigration and public health, this book presents a comprehensive history of public health and draws 10 key lessons for current immigration and health policymakers"--Brief Description: "This text examines the impact of immigration and dissects the legal and illegal immigration impacts on American policy and politics in future decades"--Marc Notes: A unique resource for the general public and students interested in immigration and public health, this book presents a comprehensive history of public health and draws 10 key lessons for current immigration and health policymakers. Publisher Marketing: The period of 1820 to 1920 was one of mass migration to the United States from other nations of origin. This century-long period served to develop modern medicine with the acceptance of the germ theory of disease and the lessons learned from how immigration officials and doctors of the United States Marine Hospital Service (USMHS) confronted six major pandemic diseases: bubonic plague, cholera, influenza, smallpox, trachoma, and yellow fever. This book provides a narrative history that relates how immigration doctors of the USMHS developed devices and procedures that greatly influenced the development of public health. It illuminates the distinct links between immigration policy and public health policy and distinguishes ten key lessons learned nearly 100 years ago that are still relevant to coping with current public health policy issues. By re-examining the experiences of doctors at three U. S. immigration/quarantine stations--Angel Island, Ellis Island, and New Orleans--in the early 19th century through the early 20th century, "Doctors at the Borders: Immigration and the Rise of Public Health" analyzes the successes and failures of these medical practitioners' pioneering efforts to battle pandemic diseases and identifies how the hard-won knowledge from that relatively primitive period still informs how public health policy should be written today. Readers will understand how the USMHS doctors helped shape the very development of U. S. public health and modern scientific medicine, and see the need for international cooperation in the face of today's global threats of pandemic diseases.

Contributor Bio:  LeMay, Michael C Michael LeMay is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at California State University-San Bernardino. He received his BS and MS degrees from the University of Wisconsin and his Ph. D. degree from the University of Minnesota (1971). Before teaching at CSUSB he taught at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where he served as Assistant Director of the Institute for Governmental Affairs. He was also Professor and Chair of the Department at the Frostburg State University in Maryland. Of his many publications, his ten political science books include four that are related to his area of special expertise--United States immigration policy. He is published in such journals as American Politics Quarterly, National Civic Review, International Migration Review, Social Science Quarterly, Southeastern Political Review, Journal of American Ethnic History, and Teaching Political Science. He is author of 11 books, including several relating to immigration policy and to minority group politics: THE STRUGGLE FOR INFLUENCE (1985, University Press of America); OPEN DOOR TO DUTCH DOOR (1987, Praeger Press); THE GATEKEEPERS (1989, Praeger Press); ANATOMY OF A PUBLIC POLICY (1994, Praeger Press); GATEWAYS TO AMERICAN IMMIGRATION AND NATURALIZATION: A DOCUMENTARY HISTORY (eds. with Elliott Barkan, 1999, Greenwood Press); THE PERENNIAL STRUGGLE (2004, Prentice-Hall), PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION (2006, Wadsworth Publishing), and U. S. IMMIGRATION: A REFERENCE HANDBOOK (2004: ABC-CLIO). He has served as a consultant to the Office of Personnel, City of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and to numerous city and county agencies in Wisconsin.