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120 square feet and 1,400 cubic foot to each patient, The hospital building is over
60 feet away from the main road and from any adjacent house. The hospital has
•a nice garden and open space all round. There is separate accommodation for
house-surgoons, nurses and servants. Special provision in the form of a couple
of tdnts pitched on the hospital grounds was made for small-pox cases.
There are no contact sheds in the hospital compound, but provision is made on
the Connaught Road opposite by putting up temporary sheds for about 20 families.
Huftkinism and Vaccination.—None of the hospital staff volunteered to get
inoculated with Haffkine's prophylactic serum, though special inducement in money
and necessary rest wore offered, whereas when the first small-pox case was admitted,
every member of the staff got vaccinated of their own accord.
Use of the Hospital.—In previous years the hospital was used for many other
diseases besides plague; this year the system was changed, and only plague cases and
those likely to develop plaguo (suspicious cases) were admitted, as, in,my opinion, it
is not safe to treat other diseases accompanied with fever in or near the plague wards.
The observation cases, if they did not develop plague, wore discharged within a few
days from admission. During the small-pox epidemic, small-pox cases were admitted
and kept away from the plague wards with a separate staff of nurse and attendants.
Conservancy.—All the ejeeta of patients were passed in bed-pans, bottles or
commodes, and were mixed with disinfectants (mercuric chloride and tartaric acid
solution 1 in 1,000) before being passed to Bhungies for final disposal, viz., carting
away to Municipal depot.
1) is infection.— All much-soiled clothes as well as dressing were destroyed by
fire. Other used clothes were steeped in a largo wooden tub containing perchloride
of mercury and tartaric acid solution (1 in 3,000) for over an hour before being passed
to dhobi for washing. Blankets, sheets, bed-covers, &c., were sent every week for
disinfection in the steam disinfector at the Arthur Head Hospital.
The floor of the wards was washed once a week'with solution of permanganate of
potash and sulphuric; acid (1 in 1,000), The walls and ceilings were flushed with
perchloride of mercury acid solution onco a fortnight. Lime washing was never
done, as it was likely to counteract the effects of the acidified disinfectants, and
further as it might form a favourable nidus for the breeding of plague-germs.
Ozone was generated in the wards morning and evening to purify the air.
Inoculated cases.—Two plague cases were inoculated with Prof. Haffkine's
prophylactic within the previous HX months, of whom one died and one recovered :—
(a) Pirojsha Jamestji Rogers, male, aged 12, inoculated in November 1899,
admitted for plague on 19th January 1900, and recovered ; (b) Namdar Kaikhosru,
Irani, male, aged 36, inoculated twice in 1899 (last in October 1899), admitted for
plague on 25th February 1900, and died.
Sickness and Mortality among Staff.—There was no plague among the str.ff, nor
any other infectious disease. The servants (wards boys, ayahs, &c.) lived in the
same quarters, where plague had made a havoc last year (10 cases and 6 deaths).
The precautions taken before the occupation of these quarters were—(a) few tile?
were removed from the roof; (#) the floor was dug out and a few inches of earth
removed and replaced by fresh earth rammed in with a largo quantity of strong
permanganate of potash and sulphuric acid solution; (c) the walls, inside of roof,
and partitions w r erc well flushed with acidified corrosive sublimate solution;
and (d] the servants wore provided with cots so as to prevent them sle^pino-on
the floor.