Table 2.

Three types of information in the historical records of epidemics (based on an analysis of Table 1).

Health outcomes	Risk factors	Interventions
Plague	Drought	Quarantine
Smallpox	Earthquake	Winter frosts
Relapsing fever	War	Great Fire of London (1666),
Jaundice	Bacteria	Good sanitation
Dancing Mania	Psychological	Broad street pump (1875),
Cholera	Spider	Hand washing
Influenza	Poor sanitation	Vaccine
Lung cancer	Overcrowding,	No smoking
Obesity	Virus	Smoking cessation
	Tobacco	Healthy food
	Excess food	Physical activity
	Physical inactivity