NationalLibraryOfScotland/medical-history-of-british-india huggingface dataset:
280
Measures to prevent the
[ APP. IX.
plague or has come from a place where plague prevails, shall visit and
examine such vessel, for the purpose of ascertaining whether she is so
infected ; and the master of such vessel shall permit the same to be
so visited and examined.
9. If the Port Health officer, on making such examination as
aforesaid, whether under regulation 7 or under regulation 8, be of
opinion that the vessel is infected, he shall forthwith give a certificate
in duplicate in the following form, or to the like effect, and shall
deliver one copy to the master and transmit the other to the Sanitary
authority. He shall also give immediate information of the arrival of
the vessel to the Sanitary Commissioner of Madras.
Certificate.
day of 189 .
I hereby certify that I have examined the vessel
, of
now lying in the port of
(or detained at
) and that I find that she is infected with plague.
Port Health Officer.
10. The master of any vessel so certified to be infected with plague
shall thereupon moor or anchor her at the place fixed for that purpose
under regulation 6 where she shall remain until the requirements of
these regulations have been duly fulfilled.
11. No person shall leave any such vessel until the examination
hereinafter mentioned shall have been made.
12. The Port Health officer shall, as soon as possible after any
such vessel has been certified to be infected with plague, examine
every person on board the same and in the case of any person suffer-
ing from plague, or from any illness which the Port Health officer sus-
pects may prove to be plague, shall certify accordingly. Every person
who shall not be so certified by him shall be permitted to land and shall
be detained under observation in a suitable isolation camp or other
place for ten days from the date of his landing or from the date of the
occurrence of the last subsequent case of plague which may occur
among the persons detained in such camp or place, whichever date
may be latest, after which he shall be released if certified by the Chief
Medical Officer on the spot to be free from plague.
13. Every person certified by the Port Health officer to be suffer-
ing from plague shall be removed, if his condition admit of it, to some
isolation hospital or other suitable place appointed for that purpose by
the Sanitary authority ; and no person so removed shall leave such
hospital or place, until the Chief Medical officer present at the spot
shall have certified that such person is free from the said disease,
ÀPP. IX. ]
spread of infection by sea.
281
If any person suffering from plague cannot be removed, the vessel
shall remain subject, for the purpose of this regulation, to the control
of the Port Health officer ; and the infected person shall not be re-
moved from or leave the vessel, except with the consent in writing of
the Port Health officer.
14. Any person certified by the Port Health officer to be suffering
from illness, which such officer suspects may prove to be plague, may
either be detained on board the vessel for any period not exceeding
four days, or may be taken, either immediately or at any time within
the said period of four days to some hospital, observation camp, or
ward or other suitable place appointed for that purpose by the Sanitary
authority, and detained there for a period of ten days, in order that it
may be ascertained whether the illness is or is not plague.
Any such person who, while so detained, shall be certified by a
competent Medical officer to be suffering from plague, shall be dealt
with as provided by regulation 13.
15. The Port Health officer shall, in the case of every vessel cef-
tified to be infected, give such directions and take such steps'as may
appear to him to be necessary for preventing the spread of infection,
and the master of the said vessel shall forthwith carry into execution
such directions as shall be so given to him.
16. In the event of any death from plague on board such vessel
while detained under regulation 10, the master shall, as directed by the
Sanitary authority, or the Port Health officer, either cause the dead
body to be taken out to sea and committed to the deep properly loaded
to prevent its rising, or shall deliver it into the charge of the Sanitary
authority for disposal, if the former procedure be not in accordance
with caste or race customs.
17. The master shall cause any articles that may have been soiled
with plague discharges to be destroyed, and the clothing and bedding
and other articles of personal use likely to retain infection which have
been used by any person who has suffered from plague on board such
vessel, or who, having left such vessel, shall have suffered from plague
during the stay of such vessel in the port to be also destroyed ; and if
the master shall have neglected to do so before the vessel arrives in
port, he shall forthwith, upon the direction of the Sanitary authority or
the Port Health officer, cause the same to be destroyed ; and if the
said master neglect to comply with such direction within a reasonable
time, the Sanitary authority shall cause the same to be carried into
execution,
18. The master shall cause the vessel to be disinfected and every
article therein, other than those last described which may probably be
c 36
282
Measures to prevent the
[ APP. IX.
infected with plague, to be disinfected or destroyed, according to the
directions of the Port Health officer.
19. Provided facilities exist for obtaining suitable water in the
port, the master shall, on the requisition oí the Port Health officer,
cause all tanks to be completely emptied and cleaned and disinfected
in such manner as the Port Health officer may direct.
20. Any mails or cargo which may be brought by any vessel so
arriving shall be landed under such precautions as the Port Health
officer may deem necessary to prevent the spread of the disease.
21. It will be the duty of the Port officer to facilitate the convey-
ance to all vessels detained under regulations 6 and 10 of such
supplies of provisions, stores or other articles as may be required by
those on board. Such supplies will be placed on the boats of the
vessel, to be subsequently removed by members of their crews.
22. All expenses incurred by any Sanitary authority in carrying
out these regulations shall be defrayed from Municipal or District or
Taluk funds in such proportions as the District Collector may, subject
to the orders of the Local Government, direct.
23. Any person disobeying or contravening any of the foregoing
regulations shall be deemed to have committed an offence punishable
under section 188 of the Indian Penal Code, and shall be liable on
conviction to be punished with imprisonment of either description for
a term which may extend to six months or with fine which may
extend to one thousand rupees or with both.
No. 86.
Extract from the Proceedings of the Government of Madras, Marine Department
No. 511, dated the 4th June 1897.
Read the following papers :—
Telegram No. 1607 (Sanitary), dated Simla, the 31st May 1897.
From—The Secretary to the Government of India, Home Department,
To—The Secretary to the Government of Madras, Local and Municipal
Department.
Madras Government G. O. 363, dated 22nd, prescribing quaran-
tine rules in supersession of those in force under Act 1 of 1870. Qua-
rantine rules issued under Act 1 of 1870 with previous sanction
Governor General in Council require to be rescinded by notification
under same Act with same sanction. Please issue notification and
forward copy for publication in Gazette of Indict.
APP. IX. ]
spread of infection by sea.
283
No. 618, Local and Municipal.
Transferred to the Marine Department.
Order thereon.
Ordered that the following notification be published in the Fort
St. George Gazette, and a copy forwarded to the Government of
India for publication in the Gazette of India :—•
In exercise of the power conferred by Act I of 1870, and with the
previous sanction of the Governor General in Council, the rules for
quarantine against plague made by the Government of Madras under
the said Act are hereby cancelled by the Governor in Council.
Venice Sanitary Convention of 1897.
No. 87.
Nos. 1623—26, dated Simla, the 1st June 1897.
From—J. P. HEWETT, Esq., C.I.E., Secretary to the Government of
India, Home Department,
To—The Secretary to the Government of Bombay, General Department.
The Secretary to the Government of Madras, Local and Municipal
Department.
The Secretary to the Government of Bengal, Marine Department.
The Chief Secretary to the Government of Burma.
I am directed to forward, for the information of the Government of
Bombay
Madras a CO py o f a translation of the Convention framed at the Sani-
Bengal '
Burma
tary Conference recently held at Venice for the purpose of consi-
dering measures to prevent the spread of the plague.
2. The regulations prescribed by the present Convention are
based on the conclusions of the Sanitary Conferences of Venice, 1892 ;
Dresden, 1893 ; and Paris, 1894 ; these conclusions have been modi-
fied to meet the special pecularities of the plague, and in accordance
with modern scientific views regarding sanitary precautions for the
prevention of the spread of epidemic disease.
3. The following are the most important points in which the pre-
sent Convention differs from the previous Conventions on which it is
based :—
(i) The fact that the period of incubation in the case of plague
may be considerably longer than in the case of cholera
has led to several important modifications. By the Venice
Conference of 1892 the period of incubation for cholera
was fixed at five days. Proposals have been made to fix
the period of incubation for plague as high as fifteen days,
but the period which has been adopted by the Conference,
for the purpose of the plague regulations, is ten days,
284
Measures to prevent the
[ APP. IX.
(ii) The list of articles of commerce which may be considered
" susceptible " has been considerably increased ; but it
has been left to the option of the Governments concerned
to allow or prohibit the importation of the commodities, on
the "susceptible " list, no article being subject to abso-
lute prohibition.
(iii) It provides that the modern, principles of disinfection should
be substituted for the obsolete system of land quarantine,
but, with a view to the protection of countries which may
find it difficult to thus protect their borders, each of the
Governments who are parties to the Convention is at
liberty to close its frontiers to travellers and merchandise.
(iv) It embodies the provisions of the Paris Convention on the
subject of the regulation of the pilgrim traffic, but in
several respects those provisions have been altered in the
directions for which the Government of India have con-
tended. A separate communication will be sent on this
subject.
4. The first chapter of the Convention deals with the measures
for the prevention of plague which are to be adopted outside Europe.
In the first place, it is laid down that the Governments who adhere
to the Convention are to notify to other Governments the existence
of plague within their several jurisdictions, and must communicate
to them a statement of the measures of prevention that are being
carried out to prevent its diffusion. This requirement as to notifi-
cation is, however, subject to certain important conditions. Thus
the area to be deemed infected is strictly limited to the actual dis-
trict, town, village, etc., where the disease prevails ; and no locality
is to be deemed infected merely on account of the importation into
it of a few cases of plague which have led to no diffusion of the
malady.
5. The Regulations next deal with the measures to be taken on
the departure of vessels from infected ports. It is laid down that
every person sailing on the vessel must be examined on shore imme-
diately before embarkation by a medical officer appointed bv the
Government and that the Consular authority interested in the'ship
may be present at the inspection. All infected and suspected articles
must be subjected to careful disinfection on shore and in the presence
of the Government medical officer in accordance with the rules for
disinfection prescribed in Chapter III of the Annexure to the Con-
vention and no persons showing symptoms of plague may be per-
mitted to embark.
APP. IX. ]
spread of infection by sea.
285
Rules have been issued by the Governments of Bombay, Madras
and Bengal under the Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897, which have been
in force for some time, prescribing precautions to be taken on the
departure of vessels. The rules framed by the Government of Bom-
bay, which are in force at the ports of Bombay and Karachi, pres-
cribe medical inspection and the removal from the vessel of any per-
son suspected to be suffering from dangerous epidemic disease. The
rules framed by the Government of Madras, which are in force at the
principal ports of the Presidency, authorise the grant of a bill-of-
health after medical inspection, the removal of any person suspected
to be suffering from plague or not to be free from plague infection,
and the disinfection of the infected portions of the ship. The rules
framed by the Government of Bengal, which are in force at the port
of Calcutta, prescribe medical inspection, the removal of persons
suffering or suspected to be suffering from plague, and the detention
of the vessel from which such persons have been removed for a
period of seven days, after the lapse of which the vessel may proceed
if no fresh case has occurred.
In order that the obligations imposed by the Convention may be
fulfilled at an infected port it is essential that the medical inspec-
tion and disinfection should be conducted exactly in the manner pre-
scribed by the regulations and summarised above. The Government
of India consider that it is also desirable that all non-professional
attendants and relatives of any persons, who on examination appear
to be suffering from plague, shall be prevented from embarking. If
after the medical examination has been completed and all the passen-
gers and crew are on board, a case of plague occurs, the patient and
his non-professional attendants and relations must be landed and
isolated on the first opportunity. The ship will then become an
infected vessel within the definition given below in paragraph 7.
Although the ports of Madras and Calcutta are not infected, the Local
Governments have, with the approval of the Government of India,
made the special rules for medical inspection referred to above, and
in the opinion of the Governor General in Council, it is desirable that
they should be assimilated, in the case of vessels sailing for ports out
of India, as far as possible to those which will, under the terms of the
Convention, have to be adopted at the infected ports of the Bombay
Presidency.
Bombay
I am to request that the rules issued by the Government of bengal
Burma
may be altered in accordance with these instructions. The rules
286
Measures to prevent the
[ APP. IX.
should be made applicable to all infected ports in the Bombay
Presidency.
6. The rules regarding pilgrim-ships which form the next portion
of the regulations will, as stated in paragraph 3 above, be dealt with
in a separate communication.
7. The regulations for the control of the general traffic in the Red
Sea and the Suez Canal are based on the threefold classification of
ships into healthy, suspected and infected adopted in the Venice Con-
vention of 1892, with the modifications rendered necessary owing
to the period of incubation in the case of plague having been fixed
at ten days.
Healthy vessels are those which have left an infected port for ten
days or more and have had no case of plague on board ; suspected
vessels are those on which, though cases of plague have occurred, no
fresh case has occurred within twelve days ; and infected vessels are
those on which plague has been present within twelve days of arrival.
The period of twelve days is arrived at, as in the case of the seven
days' period in the Convention of 1892, by adding two days to the
period of incubation.
A healthy vessel thus becomes entitled to free pratique at a port
at which it arrives ten days or more after leaving an infected port,
but the adoption of this period has the serious result that fast vessels
sailing from Bombay will arrive at the Suez Canal before pratique
can be granted. This difficulty has been satisfactorily overcome by
permitting healthy vessels to pass through the Canal in quarantine
and to complete in the Mediterranean the ten days necessary to
receiving free pratique at a port of arrival. Vessels passing through
the Canal in quarantine may, subject to the use of electric light, coal
in quarantine at Port Said by night as well as by day, and passengers
may embark in quarantine at that port.
The rules for infected and suspected ships follow those of
the Venice Convention of 1892. Vessels carrying a doctor and a
disinfecting stove are allowed to pass through the Canal in quarantine
after, in the case of infected vessels, landing those suffering from
plague and persons who have been in actual contact with the sick or
with infected articles and after disinfection of the infected compart-
ment of the vessel. Vessels without a doctor and disinfecting stove
O
are detained at Moses 5 Wells. Such vessels if suspected are detained
for the period required for disinfection and for ascertaining the con-
dition of the ship's health, while, if infected, the passengers are
detained on shore under observation for a maximum period of ten
days. The medical and sanitary staff at Moses' Wells is to be in-
creased for the purpose of carrying out these regulations.
ÁPP. IX, ]
spread of infection by sea.
287
8. The last matter to notice in the chapter of the regulations
dealing with the measures to be adopted against the plague outside
Europe is that of the measures to be taken in the Persian Gulf. The
conclusions of the Conference on this question differ greatly from
those embodied in the Paris Convention. Healthy vessels reaching
Ormuz before the expiration of ten days since they last touched at a
port infected with plague must either complete that period at Ormuz
or may, after medical inspection, continue their voyage up the Gulf
or the Shatt-ul-Arab, provided they do so in quarantine for such
term as is required to complete the ten days. The same provision
will apply to suspected vessels, that is vessels on which there has been
a case of plague, but no fresh case for twelve days, subject to sub-
mission to certain processes of disinfection, etc., at Ormuz ; and
infected vessels will, after landing their sick, together with those
persons who have been in actual contact with them, and after disin-
fection of that part of the vessel deemed to be infected, likewise
have permission to proceed on their voyage in quarantine. The final
arrangements as to the sanitary station at Ormuz are to be a matter
of agreement between the Turkish aud Persian Governments, and
until these arrangements are completed a temporary sanitary station
will be established on one of the islands in the Straits of Ormuz.
9. The second chapter of the regulation deals with the measures
to be adopted by the European Governments who have assented to
the terms of the Convention. The provisions relating to notification
have been mentioned in paragraph 4 above. Allusion has also been
made in paragraph 3 to the regulations regarding the importation of
merchandise.
This matter requires some further notice. The following are
the commodities which are classed as susceptible and the import of
which may be prohibited :
(1) Used body linen, clothes, bedding and other personal effects.
(2) Rags, including rags compressed by hydraulic pressure and
transported in bales as merchandise.
(3) Used sacking, carpets, and old embroidery.
(4) Green and untanned hides and skins.
(5) Animal refuse, claws, hoofs, horsehair, hair of animals gen-
erally, raw silk and wool.
(6) Human hair.
The prohibition of import is only to be enforced at the option of
the Government concerned. The only articles which must of neces-
sity be subjected on arrival to any precautionary measures, such as
disinfection, are clothing, bedding and similar articles, which have
288
Measures to prevent the
[ APP. IX.
been actually worn or used, and which are carried as ordinary lug-
gage, if they have been brought from an infected area and are consi-
dered by the local sanitary authority to be contaminated. The
Government of India do not consider it necessary to add to the
list of articles, the import of which by sea from infected ports into
other ports in British India is prohibited in Home Department Noti-
fication No. 513, dated the 17th February 1897, and the bringing of
which from the Bombay Presidency and Sind into other parts of
British India is prohibited in Home Department Notification No.
1033, dated the 22nd March 1897. This remark applies only to the
import of articles from the Bombay Presidency and Sind for use in
other parts of India. In reciting the obligation imposed on the coun-
tries which are parties to the Convention to confine their precau-
tionary measures to goods coming from the infected local area, it is
stated in Chapter II, section III of the Regulations, that this obligation
only exists on the express understanding that the Government of the
infected country takes the necessary measures to prevent the exporta-
tion of susceptible articles derived from the infected area. In other
words, a Foreign Government would be liberty to decline to receive
articles classed as susceptible coming from a clean port unless mea-
sures are taken in India to prevent the exportation from that port of
susceptible articles coming from the infected area. The orders con-
tained in the Home Department notifications of February and March
last alluded to above only partly fulfil this condition since they only
refer to used apparel and bedding, rags, waste paper and used
gunny-bags. All Foreign Governments have not, however, availed
themselves of the option of prohibiting the import of all the articles
classed as susceptible even from Bombay itself, and the decree of
the French Government of the 16th April 1897, which was published
in the Gazette of India of the 22nd instant under Home Department
Notification No. 1545, dated the 21st instant, and is based on the
Venice Convention of 1897, onl y prescribes prohibitory and precau-
tionary measures against goods derived from the infected area. The
decree only forbids the importation into France and Algeria of rags,
animal refuse, claws and hoofs coming directly or indirectly from the
infected local area. Raw and manufactured wool is admitted after
disinfection, and this restriction is only imposed when the commodity
comes directly from the infected area. Used and new linen, wearing
apparel, personal effects and bedding and raw hides, coming directly
or indirectly from the infected area, are admitted after disinfection.
The decree further provides that any vessel coming from an infected
area, or having on board any of the articles coming within the des-
cription given above may only enter certain specified ports. In these