Learning from the Plague: A Sustainable Healthy Society Through the Memory of the Plague in the Dutch East Indies in the Early 20th Century

Paper Abstract: Currently, Indonesia is free from the threat of the Covid-19 pandemic which has spread since 2020. Even though Indonesia is free from the threat of the Covid-19 pandemic, the importance of making population health efforts free from disease is very important. Regarding this, Indonesia during the Dutch East Indies colonial rule, especially at the beginning of the 20th century, had gone through a phase of various threats of disease outbreaks such as smallpox, cholera, influenza, bubonic plague, dysentery, rash, malaria, syphilis, and others. The aim of this writing is to analyze in more depth the efforts to handle the plague during the colonial period as a lesson related to the plague so that it can become material for historical reflection. This research uses historical research methods with heuristic, verification, interpretation and historiography stages in writing this article. In this case, the health problem of the threat of disease outbreaks in the era of the Dutch East Indies colonial government, the length of handling and attention to the native community was a difficult thing to overcome in eradicating disease outbreaks. Then, the lack of understanding and cooperation through community health results in a lack of understanding regarding disease information. Through disease management solutions such as health services, health propaganda, vaccinations, medicines and cooperation, we can learn to understand past outbreaks. Therefore, through understanding the handling of epidemics in the past, lessons can be learned in the present to create sustainable population health in Indonesia