This is a bit unfair, all doctors were fucking terrible before the late 19th century, and lowered the lifespan of everyone they touched. They also seemed to prescribe mercury for everything.<p>The only rational use for a doctor back then was if you needed emergency surgery because you were going to die very soon. It was a situation that they could only make better.<p>The problem, I guess, is that the confidence and authoritative tone of doctors has been identical from back then, when their interventions were at best useless and on average murderous, to now, when they have some chance of improving your outcome. Upper-class people fell for it, to their peril.
Quote from the article: "Dr. Taylor’s standard procedure included administering laxatives and bloodletting from the patient. In addition, Taylor used the blood from slaughtered pigeons as eye drops, and often applied a baked apple to the eye with a bandage. Adding to the abuse, he charged large sums for his procedures—especially if he judged that the patient was wealthy. Bach survived a few weeks after the second procedure, but it seems likely that these failed eye operations directly caused his rapid decline and death. Taylor’s approach was extremely unhygienic, and thus likely to lead to post-surgical infections. I remind readers that antibiotics didn’t exist back then, and an infection, once it had set in, was often fatal. In any event, Bach died on July 28, 1750 at age 65."
Nice piece.<p>The guy's name is Georg Friedrich Händel, not Handel. Even if you don't have that letter on your keyboard, you can still find ways to enter it:<p><a href="https://www.confidentgerman.com/how-to-write-umlaut-a-u-o-s-without-a-german-keyboard/" rel="nofollow">https://www.confidentgerman.com/how-to-write-umlaut-a-u-o-s-...</a>
I was amused that the article claimed that loss of <i>eyesight</i> would end an era of <i>music</i> when Beethoven's loss of <i>hearing</i> certainly didn't end his compositional ability.
The writing in this chap’s substack is a joy to read. It has the rare quality of being exactly the right length.<p>The author also did a great podcast with Tyler Cowen.