Hygiene & The First World War

Just before the outbreak of war, if you looked at people's general hygiene there was a massive divide. Like with most things, the divide was between those who had money and those who did not. For the people that lived in large houses, they could afford to have a bath when they wanted to and were expected to wash everyday, for standards were high. However, for those living in the overcrowded dirty slums, hygiene wasn't taken as seriously. We all know now that diseases spread like wildfire through the slums, passed on from person to person. Their running water would mainly consist of a pump in the yard, more often than not shared by many families. A lot of these families were weak with malnutrition and so had just about enough energy to pump the water for eating and drinking, but cleaning themselves and their surroundings weren't very high on their list, especially as a lot of them were living alongside bugs as well. 

Whilst a lot of things improved for those who volunteered to fight when the first world war broke out, with many of them getting more food than ever before, their health deteriorated hugely whilst living in the trenches. Like those that had been living in the slums, the men were packed so tightly into the trenches that diseases soon spread. 

Whilst in a lot of cases Cresol solution and chloride of lime was used as a disinfectant, it could only do some much. With the constant fighting, hygiene was pushed further down the list, there was a war to win after all. 

The trenches were designed into sections with the toilets being made away from the dugouts and living quarters. However what with the lack of space and the constant fighting, toilets soon became buckets or holes in the ground, with soldiers living and eating next to them. With bad weather, trenches often flooded, toilets included, which as we now know today can cause serious healthy problems. However at the time soldiers were told to just carry on. 

The design of the trenches was partly the the reason for the downfall of soldiers health and caused the spread of diseases. With space tight, there wasn't really any proper storage for food, which should have been hugely important when you remember that this was a time before a lot of packaging was used. As mentioned in previous posts, rats the size of a cat, could be seen living alongside the soldiers in the trenches. These rats were drawn to the areas where the food was in large supply and so stayed there. Of course with rats and other vermin are carriers of diseases, some of them deadly, but the soldiers had nowhere else they could go. 

As the fighting grew more intense and more men were being killed or injured, it was reported that due to the lack of men to carry out each role, when a man died, they were sometimes just left there or were buried where they had died rather in graves. Again, as the bodies decomposed, rats were attracted as well as reports that the bodies would sometimes rise to the surface. 

The rats, who climbed over soldiers as they slept, brought with them Weil's disease. If untreated, this could cause organ failure and internal bleeding. It is spread when humans come into contact with soil or water that has been contaminated with animal urine, and then touch their mouth, eyes, nose, open cuts or by drinking the contaminated water. 

Another problem with poor hygiene in the trenches was the spread of dysentery, which is an infection of the intestines. It not only causes diarrhoea containing blood, it also caused severe stomach cramps and vomiting. Dysentery is typically spread through people not washing their hands after using the toilet, which was something at the time wasn't deemed as important. For example, if the cook uses the bathroom and doesn't wash his hands before he prepares any meals, the bacteria will go into the food and be eaten by the soldiers and so it spreads. Anybody who comes into contact with utensils & bowls that the cook has used will also likely touch the bacteria. 

With no where to really wash your uniforms and certainly no chance to put a clean uniform on each day, soldiers uniforms were infested with lice. The lice carried with them what became known as Trench influenza and made a great many soldiers poorly and unable to fight for a while.

Of course the most famous illnesses brought about by poor hygiene during the war was Trench Foot. This came about by the cold and wet conditions, with soldiers standing in muddy puddles for hours on end without the chance to change their boots. This was particularly different during the winter months, when soldiers could be in wet and cold uniform and boots for several months waiting for them to dry out.  Symptoms start with the foot becoming numb and swelling before all the time causing damage to the blood vessels, nerves and skin. Once this starts to get bad, a horrible smell is emitted from the foot. Without prompt treatment gangrene will set in and a lot of soldiers found themselves having to have a foot or leg amputated to stop the infection. 

Of course during wartime, protocol goes out of the window, however with just a few basic routines, soldiers hygiene could have improved and a great many men could have been saved from such diseases. If food and water had been properly stored, in a way that bugs and rodents couldn't get in, the food wouldn't have been contaminated, the same as if the toilets had been further away from the living quarters. If soldiers had been made to wash their hands after using the toilet, they could have killed the bacteria and stopped it spreading through the trenches. If soldiers had had clean, dry socks and boots to put on after washing their feet, they would have been less likely to have got Trench Foot.