The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1874-11-07 00:00:00

THE STOURBRID

HOW TO LIMIT THE SPREAD OF
SCARLATINA.

At the present time there is a considerable amount
of zymotic disease prevalent, and we have been visited
' with a Revere epidemic of scarlatina, which, however,
is sensibly abating. There is no more infectious
malady than this, and very few, if any, more dangerous
or more-likely to °ripple a young life by its immediate
and remote effects on the health. The poison is, as
every one knows, of a very subtle and infections charac-
ter, and there is no reason, at least no valid reason, for
supposing that scarlatina arises spontaneously, although
Its occasional development and recurrence as an epi-
demic are vastly influenced by certain conditions over
which we can exercise no control and about which our
knowledge is relatively inexact. Of 000 thing, how-
ever, we are well assured, namely that our efforts must
be directed to limiting the spread of the infec-
tion by a rigid system if inspection, isolation, and
disinfection. A youth returns to a school with the
disease on him in a slight and unsuspected form, or
ready to manifest itself, or when apparently quite re-
covered from an attack. Once scarlatina is introduced
in this way, unless it be speedily detected and the
proper measures at once adopted, the results are very
disastrous. The authorities at most of our large
schools are so well aware of the fact that great care is
taken to guard against these occurrences, or to detect
and meet them as soon as possible. It is to be
feared, however, now that education is compul-
sory, that much unsuspected evil arises from this
source in the large schools of our towns and cities. It
has been observed, and not without a good deal of
cogency, that while we take every precaution for the
educational inspection of schools, and for securing a
due amount of cubic space and ventilation for the
pupils, we take none for their medical inspection, for
the detection and immediate separation of cases of in-
fectious fevers. In large day schools it would pro-
bably be impracticable to secure a thoroughly efficient
system of medical inspection, in consequence of the
frequency of inspection and the number of inspectors
that would be required. But we could wish that all
classes of the community were better acquainted than
they are with the power they possess of stamping iiut a
disease like scarlatina by a uniform and systematic
method of procedure. The sufferer should be isolated
at once, his clothes disinfected by dry heat in an oven,
or by being boiled, or disinfected by chemicals, and
afterwards washed and freely exposed to the air. The
measures advocated by Dr. William Budd have the
merit of being founded on a definite knowledge of the
object in view, and of a practical way of attaining it.
The oiling of the patient's whole body, the provision
of receptacles containing disinfeetanta in the sick
room for everything which comes from the patient or
which he has used, the employment if disinfectants
by the attendants for washing their hands; the use,
in short, of the most scrupulous cleanliness—the con-
finement of the patient to bed until the process of
desquarnation has been completed, and the frequent
use of warm baths during and subsequent to that pro-
cess, are all such definite and common sense measures
that no one should fail to pursue them. All books
supplied to patients during their illness should be of a
cheap kind in paper covers, so that they may, to-
gether with any toys used by them, be afterwards
burnt. We think the plan suggested by the health
officer of Liverpool a very good one for adoption—viz.,
that any medical man in attendance on a case of scar-
latina should report the eircumerance, when the clothes
and room would be disinfected by proper officers at
the public expense.—The Lancet.