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How Did Religion Hindered Medical Progress In The Middle Ages

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The Middle Ages in Europe was a period of time between the 410 AD and 1450 AD. During this time, the Church played a major role in people’s lives and controlled what information people had access to as it was the monks who copied out books. Religion hindered the development of medicine to a partial extent because the Church prohibited dissections and people followed supernatural remedies. However, it established universities and hospitals to treat people as well. Religion did contribute positively to the progress of medicine by establishing hospitals. These hospitals were attached to local churches and run by monks and nuns who provided care. Although they were often small and limited by the knowledge of the time, it was an improvement on Roman public health as they were available to everyone, not just soldiers. They also quite successful as they encouraged rest good diet and exercise so some patients did get better. Therefore, religion caused the progression medical progress in the Middle Ages because it established hospitals and cared for the sick better than the Romans had previously. However, religion hindered the development of medicine because of its message about the cause of ill health. The Church claimed that sickness was a punishment from God for the sufferer’s sins and this caused people to turn to supernatural …show more content…

It provided hospitals, but these hospitals were religious institutions that followed religious teachings about medicine. There were more doctors, but this doctors never did dissections to study the human body. Ultimately, though, religion hindered medical development in the Middle Ages because dissections were forbidden which linked to the supernatural ideas of the time that regarded ill health as a punishment from God. These ideas were carried on by hospitals and doctors who had not studied the human body for

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