22
were closed, business was paralysed, and the desolate emptiness of thoroughfares ordinarily
teeming with life was most remarkable, and continued throughout the months of December
and January, when the population had been reduced to its lowest figure."
5. At the end of January tlie Health Officer, who had been watching the
regularity of the progress of the disease from ward to ward, informed the Muni-
cipal Commissioner that the end of the crisis was near. The disease was moving
out of the central portions of the city, and working itself out into the north,
west and south of the island, where the population is comparatively thin and
scattered over a number of small villages.
Segregation.
6. On the llth December a meeting of a number of influential members
or tne various communibies in .Bombay was held at
the instance of Dr. Ν. "Ν. Kàtrak to discuss the situa-
tion. The debate showed that native opinion was still opposed to the use of
force to carry out segregation, and the evacuation of the affected localities was
suggested as the best way to deal with the plague. The following resolution
was finally carried :
" That this meeting is of opinion that it would he extremely difficult to control or stamp out
the bubonic plague, if, as at present is the case, it rages in the different localities in Bombay,
and in a large number of houses ; that it is extremely desirous that all the different communities
should concert measures with a view to start special hospitals for their communities, where the
people afflicted by the disease may be treated and attended upon by their own people ; that the
disease may be confined and restricted to within certain limits, when the drainage, sanitation,
and surroundings of these hospitals may be better looked after by the Municipality ; that the heads
of the communities may be appealed to to impress upon their own people the danger of allow-
ing the sick to remain in their own houses, where, according to expert medical opinion, they act
as so many centres for infection ; that it is necessary to disinfect the infected houses freely, and
to burn the bedding and other articles with which a deceased person attacked with the plague
may have come into contact ; that it may he pointed out compulsory segregation is in no way
intended or suggested, and it is hoped that there will be no misunderstanding on the point ; and
that the leaders may also be recommended to impress upon the people that the healthy persons
living in the infected houses would, in the interest of their own health, do well to remove from
such houses."
Committees of the different communities were appointed to carry into effect
the steps approved of in the resolution.
The Municipal Commissioner, who was present at the meeting, reports on
the proposal as follows :
" A camp of refuge for the whole of Bombay was an utterly impossible scheme ; but the propo-
sal was obviously in the right direction, and I gave the Committee all the assistance and co-opeia-
tion in my power. Camps were opened for the healthy at Connaught Road and Norfchbrook
Gardens, capable of accommodating 1,500 people, as an experimental measure, but the difficul-
ty of success in this direction was shown by the fact that these camps were hardly used. Never-
theless, the principle was successfully put into operation at various local centres of the epidemic,
and in all the outlying villages, such as Naigaum, Sewri, Koliwàda, Worli, &c., it was
the invariable practice to persuade or coerce the people to leave their houses for temporary sheds
erected in the fields., and this measure was generally attended with, the most satisfactory
results/'
7. Apart from the action taken by the Municipal Executive in the direc-
tion of providing temporary accommodation for people whose houses were
infected by the plague, a camp was erected by E>ào Saheb Ellàpa Bcallaram at
Foras Road, and another by the Tramway Company, an example which was
followed by other firms :
( ' At the height of the epidemic/' writes the Municipal Commissioner, " and afterwards, the
whole of Northern Bombay, where suitable sites could be obtained, was studded with segregation
huts ; to say nothing of the very large number of people encamped along the Maremma at Santa
Cruz, Andheri, Goregaurn, and northwards : most of the refugees remained in camp till the
middle of May, when the disease had almost vanished."
8. Not only in the city of Bombay, but in most up-country places where
the sanie measure was adopted, it was found that the people, while appreciating
the advantage of moving out of their infected houses, regarded health camps
with some suspicion, and preferred to live out in the open under the trees, &c.,
where they would be subject to no sort of restrictions. And, except where it
was feared that such improvised camps might become plague centres, it was not
thought necessary to interfere with this arrangement, the main object being to
procure the evacuation of the affected localities.