More than 2000 years ago, China's Huangdi Neijing suggested that doctors should not only master the skills of displaying Huangdi, but also "know astronomy above, geography below, and neutralize personnel". In the Yellow Emperor's Internal Classic Su Wen, it is put forward that different diseases are caused by different environments. Several endemic diseases are also clearly recorded in Lv's Spring and Autumn Annals, and in Ji Chun Ji, there is a saying that "shallow water leads to baldness and injuries". The heavy water station is crowded with people. Sweet water, how beautiful. People with heart water lock, gangrene and acne. Rushui, there are many people and many people. "
The emergence of modern medical geography
As a science, medical geography was founded at the end of 18 and the beginning of 19. The works of German L.L. Fink and C.F. fuchs played an important role in the establishment and development of medical geography. The content of its research is mostly the geographical distribution of infectious diseases caused by environmental biological factors and their relationship with geographical environment. Until the first half of the 20th century, this traditional research was still a very important part of medical geography research. Although there have been significant changes in research field, scope, diseases, depth and system, the research direction has not changed much.
Development of modern medical geography
In the mid-20th century, with the rapid development of urbanization and industrialization, as well as the rapid progress of science and technology, it brought new vitality to the development of medical geography. Mainly in the following aspects:
① In the process of continuing to study the spatial pattern of geographical distribution of diseases and emphasizing the development of eco-medical geography, the research on the relationship between diseases and environment has been deepened, and the environmental causes of diseases have been emphatically discussed.
② The concept of medical geography has made new development, and the research content is more abundant. Traditional research focuses on disease geography, while contemporary research clearly puts forward the development of health geography and health geography. Their purpose is not only to passively study the geographical problems of diseases, but also to study the geographical problems of maintaining human health and preventing diseases.
③ The diseases studied have changed. The traditional research is mainly infectious diseases, and now it has gradually turned to non-infectious diseases.
④ Strengthen application.
⑤ There are new developments in medical geographical mapping, among which the United States, the Federal Republic of Germany, Britain, Japan and China have successively compiled many related atlases. Great progress has been made in painting methods, techniques and contents.
⑥ Electronic computers and mathematical methods are widely used for data processing and simulation research.