title: The fault doctrine and injury control.
abstract: An analogy is drawn between the fourteenth-century conceptualization of infectious disease and the twentieth-century conceptualization of trauma. In both cases, causality is associated with faulty human behavior which acts as a handicap to progress. It is suggested that the practice of attributing accident causality to faulty behavior restricts the development of preventive activities in three ways: it implies that allocation of culpability is synonymous with identification of cause; it inhibits countermeasure implementation directly; and it concentrates on behavior instead of environmental hazards. A more useful and more appropriate approach is outlined and discussed.
mesh_terms: D000062:Accidents, Occupational / Q000517:prevention & control; D000063:Accidents, Traffic; D001519:Behavior; D004739:England; D049671:History, 18th Century; D006801:Humans; D007878:Legislation as Topic / Q000266:history; D012306:Risk; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000209:etiology / Q000266:history / Q000517:prevention & control*