60
MEDICAL AND SANITARY REPORT OF THE NATIVE ARMY OF BOMBAY.
Food.
5. Suitable compensation is allotted to each fighting man when the price of grain
exceeds a certain fixed rate. The want of fresh vegetables is
still felt, these being both scarce and expensive.
Duties, exercise, and amuse-
ments : their effects on health.
6. I have in some cases traced the origin of acute bronchial and pulmonic lesions to
exposure while on night duty during the cold weather. I at
once recommended the adoption of greatcoats as an article of
wearing apparel on such occasions, with good results. " Kneel-
ing drill" in the case of recruits just joined from the Deccan has given rise to vague lesions
of the knee-joint ; out of a batch of sixteen, five were admitted into hospital soon after this
drill began,—the right knee in each case was swollen more or less from general infiltration
of its surrounding cellular tissue : this condition was very persistent, requiring in four cases
leave to their native country for change of air. A talimkhana exists in the lines; the sepoys
collect there occasionally, and go through different calisthenic and other exercises.
Hospital and its surroundings :
present condition, hygienic and
otherwise.
7. The hospital is a good one, well situated, fully ventilated, clean, and in good repair.
Accommodation for the hospital establishment is defective, and
would be found more so if the sanctioned subordinate staff was
present.
General health and physique.
8. A great improvement has taken place in the health of this corps for the past year,
as compared with that of the previous one. In 1876 the admis-
sions were 677, while for the year under report they were 377.
The abolition of the Burda Chowkey outpost may reasonably be taken as chiefly instru-
mental to this improved condition. In physique they are a fine body of men, with the excep-
tion of a few old sepoys, who will probably be invalided this year.
Influence of climate or local
circumstances on health.
9. Under this heading I wish to draw special attention to the prevalence of scurvy ;
it appears to be rooted in the corps, and is an almost constant
complication of disease. The scarcity and dearness of vege-
tables, as before alluded to, would account for it. But I hope
when the evil effects of the Burda Chowkey climate have been thoroughly eradicated from
t h e s e p o y s ' c o n s t i t u t i o n s w e m a y s e e a m a r k e d d i m i n u t i o n i n t h e n u m b e r o f a d m i s s i o n s f r o m
scorbutic lesions.
Details of treated.
10. The following table contrasts the causes of admissions into hospital for 1876 and
1877; the chief diseases are noted :—
1876.
1877.
Febricula
17
32
Ague
215
74
Chronic rheumatism
64
19
Soft chancre
6
1
Scurvy
34
5
Bronchitis
36
6
Asthma
7
7
Pneumonia
6
4
Dysentery
39
15
Diarrhœa
11
5
Colic
22
6
Guinea-worm
2
5
Mortality.
11. Four deaths took place in hospital and one on sick leave.
Epidemics.
12. None appeared.
Vaccination and re-vaccination.
13. Forty-five primary vaccinations were performed, and 85 re-vaccinations. The
subject has received strict attention during the year.
Invaliding and its causes.
14. There were twenty-three men invalided from the following causes :—chronic
rheumatism, and diseases of the eye, two each ; dyspepsia and
right inguinal hernia, one each; and general debility seventeen.
The general cause of debility was old age, with perhaps a rheumatic taint, combined in
some cases with scurvy. Two men were discharged from the service as unfit, viz., one, a sepoy
of six years' service, on account of epilepsy, the other a recruit who had sustained a severe
sprain of his knee-joint.