The article examines the first socially organized efforts to fight cancer in Mexico. It analyzes how the National Campaign Against Cancer (Campaña Nacional Contra el Cáncer), which ran from 1941 to the early 1990s, played a role in the use of cancer treatment and detection services. It also explores the irrational fear of cancer that some healthy people developed and, at the other extreme, the false hopes the sanitary campaign raised among many of the ill, while looking as well at discrimination of these ill and the popular belief that cancer was contagious. Another focus is on efforts by sanitary authorities to collect epidemiological information and the challenges they ran into. Lastly, it analyzes the scope and limitations of the fight against this disease.

Este trabajo estudia los primeros esfuerzos socialmente organizados en México para combatir al cáncer. Analiza el papel que desempeñó la Campaña Nacional Contra el Cáncer, que se aplicó entre 1941 y los tempranos 1990, en la utilización de los servicios de tratamiento y detección de cáncer, el temor irracional a la enfermedad desarrollado por algunas personas sanas y, en el extremo opuesto, las falsas esperanzas que la propaganda sanitaria despertó en muchos enfermos, la discriminación de éstos y la creencia popular de que el cáncer era una enfermedad contagiosa, entre otros aspectos. Se ocupa, también, de los intentos de recopilar información epidemiológica por parte de las autoridades sanitarias y de las dificultades para obtenerla. Finalmente, analiza los alcances y límites de la lucha contra el padecimiento.

Neste debate, historiadores latino-americanos comparam a pandemia de gripe de 1918-1919 com a que varre o continente em 2009, sobretudo as experiências de México, Argentina e Brasil. Analisam as estratégias adotadas nos dois momentos, com ênfase em isolamento, vigilância em portos e aeroportos, intervenções nas cidades. Comparam a atuação dos Estados nacionais e governos locais, a posição dos médicos e dos meios de comunicação e o comportamento das populações, especialmente no tocante ao medo e à morte. Analisam o desempenho das estruturas de assistência às populações e as medidas terapêuticas e profiláticas recomendadas por órgãos públicos de saúde, por interesses privados ligados à venda de medicamentos e pelas medicinas populares e caseiras. O debate trata, ainda, da influência que a experiência de 1918 teve sobre as avaliações da crise atual, bem como do legado que deixará para o futuro.

In this debate, Latin American historians compare the 1918-1919 flu pandemic with the one sweeping the continent in 2009, focusing especially on the experiences in Mexico, Argentina, and Brazil. They analyze the strategies adopted on both occasions, above all isolation measures, port and airport surveillance, and urban interventions. Comparisons are drawn between the actions of federal and local governments, positions taken by doctors and the media, and people's behavior, particularly regarding fear and death. The debaters also analyze the performance of assistance structures, the treatment and prevention measures recommended by public health agencies and private groups with a vested interest in drug sales, and popular and home remedies. The debate extends to how the 1918 experience has influenced the evaluation of today's crisis and what legacy it may leave behind.

The article examines the scientific, political, and economic elements that permitted the birth of modern public health in Mexico under the Porfirio Díaz administration (1876-1910). Firstly, a portion of Mexican physicians were open to the discoveries of microbiology, immunology, and epidemiology. Secondly, the State's growing concentration of power in public health matters ran parallel to its concentration of disciplinary political power and enabled this new knowledge to be placed at the service of collective health problem prevention. Lastly, both imperialism and the Porfirian elite needed to protect their business interests. The article evaluates public health achievements and limitations during the Porfirian period, abruptly interrupted by the revolution begun in 1910.

Este trabajo aborda el nacimiento de la salud pública moderna en México durante el gobierno de Porfirio Díaz (1876-1910) y examina los elementos científicos, políticos y económicos que lo hicieron posible: en primer término, la recepción por parte de los médicos mexicanos de los descubrimientos de la microbiología, la inmunología y la epidemiología; en segundo lugar, la concentración creciente del poder del Estado en asuntos sanitarios que fue paralela a su concentración de poder político disciplinador y permitió poner los nuevos conocimientos al servicio de la prevención de los problemas colectivos de salud; finalmente, la necesidad del imperialismo y la elite porfiriana de proteger sus intereses comerciales. El artículo hace un balance de los alcances y limitaciones de la salud pública del porfiriato, la cual se vio interrumpida de manera abrupta por la revolución iniciada en 1910.