People have always tried to heal

For thousands of years, every community has looked for ways to fight illness and pain.

Medicine is the knowledge and skill of keeping people healthy and helping the sick get better. Long before hospitals and pills, people used plants, prayers, rest and careful watching to work out what helped a sick person recover.

• Early healers learned by watching which plants made people feel better.
• Knowledge was passed down from parents to children by word of mouth.
• Over time, new discoveries changed medicine again and again.

Sangomas and inyangas

South Africa has a long tradition of indigenous healers who are still trusted by many people today.

Healing plants and careful training

Traditional medicine is built on deep knowledge of the natural world.

An inyanga makes muti (medicine) from herbs, roots and bark. This knowledge is powerful and must be handled carefully - the right plant in the right amount can heal, but the wrong amount can be dangerous. That is why healers train for many years before they are allowed to treat people.

• Healers say they are 'called' to the work by their ancestors.
• Training includes strict rules, special diets and learning about many plants.
• Some plants used long ago are still important in medicine today.

Medicine in early societies

Across the world, ancient peoples slowly built up knowledge about the body and healing.

In places like ancient Egypt, healers set broken bones, treated wounds and wrote down their remedies. In many societies people mixed real cures with prayers and charms, because they did not yet know what actually caused illness.

• People did not know that tiny germs cause many diseases.
• Many believed illness was a punishment or came from bad air.
• Even so, some early treatments really did work and were kept for centuries.

The smallpox epidemic

In 1713 a deadly disease reached the Cape and changed the lives of the people living there.

Smallpox arrived at the Cape in 1713, brought by a passing Dutch ship. It spread quickly. The Khoikhoi (Khoisan) people were hit hardest of all, because the disease was new to them and their bodies had little protection against it.

• An epidemic is when a disease spreads fast among many people.
• There were no vaccines yet, so the disease could not be stopped.
• Many Khoikhoi communities lost huge numbers of people.

Three ideas that changed medicine

In the last 250 years, a few great discoveries made medicine far more powerful.

Clean water and public health

Once people understood germs, governments began working to stop diseases before they started.

Public health means caring for the health of a whole community, not just one sick person. When towns provided clean water, drains and rubbish removal, far fewer people caught diseases like cholera and typhoid that spread through dirty water.

• Clean drinking water is one of the biggest life-savers in history.
• Toilets and sewers keep germs away from where people live.
• Vaccination programmes protect many children at once.

The 'Black October' flu

In 1918 a fast-spreading flu swept across South Africa and the world.

In September and October 1918, the Spanish Flu reached South Africa, first appearing at the ports. It spread so fast that October 1918 became known as 'Black October'. Because there were no antibiotics yet, doctors could not cure the pneumonia that killed many patients.

• Around 300,000 people are thought to have died in South Africa.
• Mineworkers and poorer communities were among the worst affected.
• Schools, shops and public places had to close to slow the spread.

When health rules were not fair

Sometimes fear of disease was used in unfair ways.

In 1901, cases of bubonic plague were found in Cape Town. The government used the fear of plague as a reason to force many black residents out of the city and move them to a separate area. Health worries were real, but the way people were treated was unfair and unequal.

• Everyone deserves fair and equal health care.
• Illness was sometimes blamed on the poorest people instead of poor living conditions.
• Studying this helps us see why fair health care matters today.

The world's first heart transplant

On 3 December 1967 a South African team did something no one had ever done before.

At Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, Dr Christiaan Barnard and his team performed the world's first human heart transplant. They gave a new heart to a very sick patient, Louis Washkansky. It was a huge moment that made doctors around the world believe transplants were possible.

• The operation lasted about nine hours and used the skills of a large team.
• Hamilton Naki, a self-taught assistant, helped develop the surgery skills behind it.
• The patient lived for 18 days before dying of pneumonia - but medicine had changed forever.

Medicine through time

1. Long ago Traditional healers use plants and holistic care
2. 1713 Smallpox epidemic strikes the Cape
3. 1796 First vaccine (Jenner, smallpox)
4. 1901 Plague scare used to move people in Cape Town
5. 1918 Spanish Flu 'Black October' in South Africa
6. 1928 Penicillin discovered (first antibiotic)
7. 1967 World's first heart transplant, Cape Town

Traditional and modern medicine together

In South Africa today, both kinds of medicine are still important.

Many South Africans visit both a clinic and a traditional healer. Scientists have even found that some plants used by traditional healers really do work - for example, the Madagascar periwinkle, long used in traditional medicine, is now used in modern cancer treatment.

• Traditional knowledge can help scientists find new medicines.
• Modern medicine offers vaccines, surgery and antibiotics.
• Respecting both helps care for the whole community.

What we learned

Medicine has changed enormously over time, but the wish to heal has always stayed the same.

We saw traditional healers and healing plants, deadly epidemics like smallpox and the 1918 flu, great discoveries such as vaccines and antibiotics, the importance of public health, and South Africa's own first heart transplant. Now show what you remember.