Introduction: The Past Continuous of Epidemiology

Abstract

From early 2020, epidemiological research has been in the public eye like never before, thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic. Epidemiology has been instrumental in recognizing and framing the pandemic, assessing its scale, and shaping the global response. Much to their surprise, epidemiologists have also been drawn into the highly politicized disputes around the pandemic response. But both pandemics and epidemiologists have been around for centuries or, depending on definitions, even for millenia. Apart from shortly outlining the contents of the book, the introductory chapter charts the boundaries of epidemiology with reference to adjacent fields of inquiry, reviews the widely varied views on its emergence as a disipline, and discusses the historiography of epidemiology—which, much like its subject, is extensive but somewhat nebulous.