The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1876-11-01
Autumnal Diseases.

The season of fevers, says the New
York Tribune, has set in all over the
country: yellow fever in the South,
typhoid in one direction, malarial Of
different types in others. A few nights
of sharp frost would doubtless clear and
clean the air of them. but in the mean
time it behooves every man to look to
his own health and that of bis family.
Physicians, as a rule, concern them
selves but little with preventive meas
ures, and in fact neither do the average
Americans who are their patients. In
theory we all are convinced that each
disease has rational account to give Of
it's origin, but we act as if we held the
old doctrine that they came by the visi-
tation OF God and not from q defective
drain pipe or rotting garbage in the
cellar. There is but little danger of
yellow fever in the Northern cities.
The season is far advanced, the quaran-
tine is strictly enforced, and, the surest
safeguard of all, the popular dread OF
the disease is 30 great that wherever it
appears each man becomes health
officer. There are commoner forms of
fever from which we have reason to ap-
prehend smuch more danger. The in
tense heat of June and July has told
upon every man and woman who re-
manned in the cities during those
months. It has lessened their stock of
vitality to an exceptional degree, and in
consequence rendered them susceptible
to poisonous influences in the air. In
this month there are always malarious
fogs arising from the decomposing
vegetable matter in low-lying meadows
and gardens-a danger which nothing
but the early frosts will cure. The chief
preventive measures to be adopted are
to protect the body by flannel next the
skin, never to go out in the morning
without full meal, and to keep the d.
gestive organs in healthy condition and
the mind cheerful.
Typhoid fevers are communicated, on
the contrary, by conveyance of animal
secretions. At this season every house
holder should look to the condition of
drains and water pipes on his premises,
and not let sq1eamish delicacy hindes
him from reporting nuisanoes on the
premises of his neighbor. It is amazing
to what pollution of the air, in their
sumptuous dwellings, churches, steam
and horse cars, Americans will submit
in silence. There is another class of
fevers which originate in decaying vege-
table matter, dampness, and the poison
generated by bad ventilation in over
crowded houses. If every respectable
man would see that the laws of health
were enforced in his own neighborhood,
there would be little fear from this
especial messenger of death. In case of
attack from fever, the usual course is to
apply all domestic remedies before call
ing in q physician. The headache,
languor, etc. appear 80 slight series
of symptoms that it is natural the whole
family pharmacop@ia of pills, draughts
and stimulants should be tried before
outside assistance is summoned. The
truth is, however, that the remedies for
each kind of fever widely differ, and
the home practice 200 often gives The
surest help to the disease in its fatal
work.
Our advice, then, to readers is, in
DrleI, TO Keep tue lever out VI IuelI
houses. but after it is once in to leave
the fight with it to more skilled hands
than their own. In no country, too, is
the matter of disinfection so neglected
as in our own. The patient being dead
or cured, his friends leave the disease to
60 on its way unchecked, while with
due precaution OF disinfecting bedding,
clothes, walls, etc., it might be stopped
short. A free use of carbolic acid or chic
ride of limo is beneficial in ever house
where there is no illness. But best of
all is fresh, clean air, and plenty of it.
These counsels are hackneyed beyond
question but that they are needed is
proved by the fact that eight out of ten,
even of cultured families, disregard