The Republic of Ireland was beset by many communicable epidemics in the 1940's. Most of the killer diseases, such as typhus, smallpox and tuberculosis and various types of mental illnesses affected the Irish population and wiped out a majority of the people who lived in the Republic of Ireland between the year 1650 and the year 1940.

Medical science as an academic discipline developed in the Republic of Ireland in the seventeenth century and in the eighteenth century. William Wilde had a major role to play in the establishment of the Dublin School of Medicine, which is located in the city of Dublin, the capital of the Republic of Ireland, in the nineteenth century.

The growth of medical schools and the relationship between religion and medicine in the Republic of Ireland are important aspects in the study of the history of the society that prevailed in the Republic of Ireland in the 1940's.