Does ‘Typhoid Mary’ have lessons for us in the era of coronavirus?

Judith Walzer Leavitt, an American historian and professor emerita at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who specializes in medical history and women’s studies, says Mallon’s story illustrates a unique and unprecedented period in medical history. “It’s a wrenching personal story. She was the first healthy carrier of typhoid fever to be discovered, so people had never seen it before and didn’t know what to do,” she told CTVNews.ca during a phone interview on Sunday from Madison, Wis. “It was completely unheard of. People in the medical community thought, ‘How could this be?’ There were a lot of skeptics,’ Leavitt added.