Public health and the risk factor : a history of an uneven medical revolution / William G. Rothstein.

Rochester, NY : University of Rochester Press, 2003.

xiii, 466 pages ; 24 cm.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 427-454) and index.

The origins of probability and statistics -- Censuses and vital statistics -- Statistical analyses of medical and social data -- Life insurance and the risk factor -- Cultural and environmental influences on urban mortality rates -- The germ theory and health education in diphtheria and tuberculosis control -- Health education and infant mortality in New York City -- The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company health education programs -- Early twentieth-century mortality trends and rheumatic heart disease -- The early years of the coronary heart disease epidemic -- Causes, correlations, and the etiology of disease -- Cigarette smoking and statistical correlations -- Blood pressure and the benefits of treatment -- The Framingham heart study and the risk factor -- Theories of the causes of coronary heart disease -- The diet-heart hypothesis -- Dietary recommendations and guidelines -- The secular decline in the coronary heart disease epidemic.