Accomplishments Of Sara Josephine Baker

Sara Josephine Baker was a devoted individual who had a major impact on the Progressive era (1890’s-1920s. Although she was faced with obstacles such as discrimination, she managed to overcome issues that could have potentially hindered her ability to educate others on how improve their health. Her main focus was on improving women and children’s health. Using her knowledge of public health, Sara Josephine Baker implemented health plans that proved to be beneficial to society. Going forward, I will further discuss the accomplishments of Sara Josephine Baker and the positive outcome that she had on public health during the progressive era.
Sara Josephine Barker was born in Poughkeepsie, New York in 1873. With her mother being a graduate of

To make ends meet with the business finances, they maintained employment at a New York life insurance company, which opened the doors for female physicians to obtain employment in the field. Being employed in different settings relating to health provided her the ability to learn so many different things about health outside of hospitals and clinics. She obtained a position as a medical inspector for the Department of health in New York City in 1901. Her outstanding performance of work earned her the role of the first assistant commissioner of public health in 1907. Baker overseen programs that posed a potential threat to health and was acknowledged for her role in helping to track down Typhoid Mary. Mary Mallon also referred to as Typhoid Mary, was a cook who had no idea that she was spreading the disease on to others whom she had cooked for. Once she was captured and advised that she was thought to be the cause of people that she had cooked for catching the disease she was in denial because she didn’t suffer any major illness from the Typhoid. Typhoid Mary was released and instructed not to resume her position as a cook in an effort to prevent others from contracting the disease but disobeyed the request and went back to her occupation as a cook. She was then tracked down again with the help of Baker and

Using her knowledge of preventive care she created the Little Mothers League. The program provided training to young girls on how to care for infants so that they were able to care for babies in their household, allowing their parents to maintain employment to provide the financial stability for the family. In addition to constructing milk and midwife training and regulations at baby health stations, Baker also created rules that were proven to be beneficial to lowering the infant mortality rate. Because of her excessive work and dedication her thirty-five schools had decided to follow her school health plan. The infant mortality began to experience a decrease and eventually led to New York City having the lowest number of mortality rates of infants. The infant mortality rate had in fact declined by more than forty percent between 1908 and 1914(NYU Health Sciences libraries).She formed an Association geared toward child hygiene in 1909 and was presented with an opportunity to teach a class on child hygiene at the University School of Medicine but remaining true to her beliefs, Baker decided that she would not accept the offer if she was not allowed to attend the school earn her degree in public health. The college did not allow for the admission of women at the school at the time. Initially declining her