From Outbreak to Archive: Tales of Public Health

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‘From Outbreak to Archive’ is a series of films combining puppetry, model-making and animation created by young people in July 2020.  Seeking to explore the history of public health and disease through documents from The National Archives, the young people created, animated, scripted and recorded their films at home as a response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The young people connected virtually, taking part in document and filmmaking workshops.  They considered these questions:

What were the responses of the authorities, what public information was available, and what were the suggested cures and remedies for some of these diseases?

The young people also reflected on their own experiences of the Covid-19 pandemic and brought these considerations to life by weaving them into their films.  The resulting films are a poignant testament to the resilience and imagination of the group involved.

The series of films can now be used by teachers and students as brief overviews, introductions or interest points for the various topics explored within the film. 

The following questions can be asked of each film:

• What type of documents are shown that inspired the film?
• What do the documents reveal about this disease? For example, how was it treated (cures and remedies)? Does the document capture any personal experiences? How did the government and society respond to the spread of this disease?
• Why do you think this document has been kept at The National Archives?

Explore our related resources to discover more documents related to health and medicine through time.

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