The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1876-01-11
A State Board of Health,

state board OF HEALTH
As suggested in the Governors address
the establishment of State Board OF Health
will be brought to the attention of the Legis-
lature this session. In an enlightened COM
munty like ours the advantages of such an
establishment ought to present themselves
at once, and there should be little need of
argument or Illustration upon the point.
While in this section of the country we are
flee from the great epidemics like cholera
and the yellow fever, which have made so
frightful ravages elsewhere, we are subject to
small poX, to that terrible sc0urge, the ty-
phoid fever, and to many other dreaded dis
eases which experience has shown to be to a
very great extent capable of prevention by
Franklin's that "public health is public
wealth. and the philosophers of our day
have found high significance in the ascer-
tanned relationship of physical health TO the
social and moral improvement of individuals
and of society. The maxim that cleanliness
is next to godlinesS may have arisen from
misquotation, but it nevertheless formulates
a great truth. There is closer relationship
and interdependence between the health of a
people and its morality and prosperity than is
evident on superficial view.
The subject too commends itself to the at
tention from a narrower and more selfish
standpoint. Science teaches us that disease
and death are chiefly visitations of God for
violations of the physical code, that man is
born to health and longevity, that disease is
abnormal, and that in the majority of cases it
is preventable by human agencies. Statistics
show us that there is prodigal waste of hui
man life, that but three men in every thous-
and born live out their natural term OF years.
that nearly half of those dying have not
passed their fifth birthday. Observation
shows US that this enormous waste of life is
wholly unnecessary, and that it is largely
caused by agencies which men can remove or
destroy. Bad drainage, impure air of dwell
ings, improperly prepared foods, unwhole-
some occupations, gluttony, inebriety, and a
thousand other preventable causes 90 to
swell the death list. Outbreaks of. typhoid
fever bave been repeatedly traced to merbi-
single dwelling with we'll contaminated BY
an ill-kept drain, or with its sewerage gath
cred in stone heap near the house or with
It's cellar rank with decaying vegetables, has
given birth 70 disease which sweeps through
whole village or half a city. Fever, phthisis,
influenza, and thousand other Affections
are nursed by neglect of simple sanitary rules.
Nuisances, dangerous to society and destruc-
tive to health, are suffered to exist unchal-
lenged. Then people fall to wondering at
"the unhealthy season." and not infrequent-
ly go back to the old and exploded art of as
trology for an explanation.
Preventive medicine is distinctly recog-
nized art, the great Importance of which is
daily becoming more generally acknowledged.
1t has in its power to do away with many of
the evils alluded to above. And as disease
is not only a calamity to the individual, but
positive loss to the state, the state for Its self
protection has the right TO take effective
measures for the preservation of the public
health. These measures can only be carried
out by means of thorough organization and
effort, by selecting body of men. trained in
their business, who have made sanitary
| measures a study, who can suggest proper
preventive and remedial agencies, who are
competent to collect the necessary statistics
of death and disease upon which generaliza-
tions can be made and from which deductions
can be drawn, who will have the power
to call for needed information, who can sug-
geSt in their reports measures of public uti-
ity, and whose reports shall be means of
educating the people in sanitary science
Thus the conditions Of healthy life will be-
come matters of public knowledge and in
terest, attention will be drawn to the subject,
public opinion will become educated to sup
port proper sanitary measures, and people
will come TO understand that no one has
right to infiict or foster an evil which en-
dangers either his own or his neighbor's
health. The fostering Of a public spirit like
that should be strongly encouraged.
The details of the proposed plan have not
yet been brought to the notice of the Legis-
latnre. The intention is doubtless TO model
the Board after those established in other
states, but TO make no demands upon the
public purse. Public health is as much a
matter of state interest as public education,
and a new and well regulated method of san
itary administration and health laws is pub
lie necessity; for the state owes to lis popu-
laton the provision of measures of protec-
ton against those causes of sickness and
mortality that cannot be adequately restrained
without general provisions of law prescribing
the removal and prevention of unnecessary
danger and injury to life and health. Still at
this time Of business depression and financial
distress and heavy taxation the Legislature
will not feel like creating more salaried
officers or imposing system of fees upon
the people. But should the philanthropic
gentlemen who advocate the proposed Board
feel willing to volunteer their services to the
state for time in order to bring before the
people the benefit of their system of sanitary
regulation they will be likely TO meet with
LITTLE OnnnSition