Swales J D
School of Medicine, Leicester Royal Infirmary, UK.
J Hum Hypertens. 1996 Mar;10(3):137-42.
Professional historians generally treat the phrase 'what if' with pardonable scorn. It is a speculation which necessarily will never be tested in the real world. Nevertheless, there is a reasonable likelihood that, if typhoid fever had not carried off Frederick Akbar Mahomed at the age of 35, clinical research in Britain would have been both stronger and more highly developed at the beginning of the 20th century. Indeed, if he had lived to continue his most ambitious project, we would have had access to a unique source of clinical and epidemiological data 70 years before anything similar was contemplated.
专业历史学家通常会带着情有可原的轻蔑态度看待“如果……会怎样”这句话。这是一种必然永远无法在现实世界中得到验证的推测。然而，有一个合理的可能性是，如果伤寒热没有在35岁时夺去弗雷德里克·阿克巴·穆罕默德的生命，英国的临床研究在20世纪初就会更强大、更高度发达。事实上，如果他能活着继续他最雄心勃勃的项目，在类似的事情被考虑之前70年，我们就会有一个独特的临床和流行病学数据来源。
