Was thinkiing about John Snow and his discovery that the spread of cholera was associated with drinking water - and specifically the pump in Broad St, Soho.

The water board weren't over-impressed with Snow's work - even though he rapidly stopped the spread of the disease. I guess you could call them cholera deniers.

Have this vision of the cholera deniers pointing out that the people of Soho were dying with cholera, and not of cholera.

Some of them would have pointed out that many people in Soho had underlying conditions - poverty, syphilis, no teeth. Maybe that was causing them to die and the cholera was just latching on to them in their weakened states?

The Delingpole, Hartley-Brewer and Young faction would have been Cholidiots, telling people the water was fine and there was no outbreak of cholera - just a few people with dicky tummies.

And Piers Cholera would be claiming it had all been a hoax to stop people drinking water in Soho - scam to get them to drink water from the New River Water Company.

There'd have been demos of cholera deniers at the Broad Street pump, demanding the handle be re-instated so they could drink the water because it was their favourite water and they didn't believe there was anything wrong with it.

Meanwhile there would have been an active movement saying it was their right to dump dirty nappies in cess pits.

When Bazalgette started planning his sewers, the cholidiots would have claimed that (a) he had a foreign name and (b) maybe he had faked up cholera so he could make a fortune putting in decent drains.

(should stress the cholidiots worrying about the name and alleging Bazalgette faked it for profit were different to the Cholidiots saying it was just a tummy ache. There was a lot of cholidiots about).

(the tummy ache Cholidiots were basically doing it to sell penny dreadfuls with terrible takes on the outbreak).

(cue the people arguing that England could have really optimised at a manageable amount of cholera)

Parliament decided it was worth "collosal expense" but reached zero cholera. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Bazalgette#Early_life