Why Semmelweis's doctrine was rejected: evidence from the first publication of his results by Friedrich Wieger, and an editorial commenting on the results.

Abstract

We present English translations of two French documents to show that the main reason for the rejection of Semmelweis's theory of the cause of childbed (puerperal) fever was because his proof relied on the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy, and not because Joseph Skoda referred only to cadaveric particles as the cause in his lecture to the Academy of Science on Semmelweis's discovery. Friedrich Wieger (1821-1890), an obstetrician from Strasbourg, published an accurate account of Semmelweis's theory six months before Skoda's lecture, and reported a case in which the causative agent originated from a source other than cadavers. Wieger also presented data showing that chlorine hand disinfection reduced the annual maternal mortality rate from childbed fever (MMR) from more than 7 per cent for the years 1840-1846 to 1.27 per cent in 1848, the first full year in which chlorine hand disinfection was practised. But an editorial in the Gazette médicale de Paris rejected the data as proof of the effectiveness of chlorine hand disinfection, stating that the fact that the MMR fell after chlorine hand disinfection was implemented did not mean that this innovation had caused the MMR to fall. This previously unrecognized objection to Semmelweis's proof was also the reason why Semmelweis's chief rejected Semmelweis's evidence.