[The "learned" forerunners of Colombian independence's thoughts regarding public health]

Ascertaining the "learned" forerunners of Colombian independence's thoughts about health problems in Nueva Granada's population during the last years of colonial Spanish government.

Historical research was undertaken based on studying the personal writing of the intellectual elite who promoted the independence movement.

Writing was found regarding the relationship between the population's unhealthy conditions and Nueva Granada's vast fertility. Some considerations concerning the importance of order and cleanliness in children's healthy development were also found. Their written opinions assigning great responsibility to the miasmas (produced by decaying organic matter) in the occurrence of illness and epidemics was also found.

The learned forerunners dealt with population health problems as part of the intellectual challenge in helping to build a progressive society able to produce wealth and well-being. Their trust in human-beings' rational ability and in the great potential of scientific knowledge, inherited from the eighteen-century European enlightenment philosophers, served them as an intellectual foundation.