El Servicio de Salud Pública de los Estados Unidos en Puerto Rico, 1898-1918

Abstract

When the United States occupied Puerto Rico in 1898, its Marine-Hospital Service (present-day Public Health Service) assumed resposability for foreign quarantine. In the next 20 years its officers participated in most efforts to improve sanitary conditions on the Island. The establishment of the Department of Health in 1911 and the internal autnomy allowed by Congress in 1917 signaled the withdrawal of PHS officers from routine participation in local concerns. Their reports throughout this period illuminate not only scientific activities, but also social issues such as psychosomatic discomfort among expatriate administrators, racial distintions, and federal-local colonial relationship.