The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1888-10-26
NEED OF MEDICAL CONVENTIONS
CIV. o. Smith, in Male Wreath. Octoher
go, 1889

care of lepers, there has been in certain
directions failure and neglect in dealing
with the subject.
For quarter of a century the native
race has been attacked by most malig-
nant and terrible malady. With great
expenditure of public funds, and the
employment of many physicians and
agents the government has attempted to
care for the afflicted ones and prevent
the spread of the disease. Talented
physicians, and others deeply interested
IN the welfare of the people, have given
earnest attention to the subject, and very
much has been accomplished; and while
desiring not to detract at all from the
Importance and value of what has been
done, the object of this paper is to call
attention to the desultory nature of the
most of these efforts, and the lack of
concert of action.
For twenty-five years the disease has
been spreading; with relentless fatality
it has seized upon its victims. Rank,
place, wealth, sex and age have not
been regarded; but the rich and the
poor, the tender and the strong, those
high IN influence and the obscure have
alike fallen before the devouring pesti-
lence.
We are filled with horror when we
hear of yellow fever, or cholera, or small
pOX attacking communities and DESTROY
ing hundreds of people; and the story of
Russian exiles torn from their homes
and consigned to living graves in Siberia,
eXCites our pity and Indignation homes
desOlated, and noble lives sacrificed by
the ravages of intemperance, arouse our
compassion. Such things band people
and communities together, combinations
are made, conferences are held; the
highest ability and the most powerful
means are employed to protect the peO-
pie. And it is right, anything less would
be almost criminal.
1t is not with spirit of elimination,
nor with sweeping reckless disregard of
all that has been accomplished and at
tempted, but with due regard for it all,
that the charge is here made that we as
a community have not done our whole
duty in this matter.
Without descanting upon the other
derelictiOns, it would seem that the fail
ing to cause frequent or stated confer
rences among the trained physicians,
who are employed by the people to Crap
pie with this national and dire calamity,
has been negligence for which we are
culpable.
Leprosy wherever found has been a
disease which has heretofore baff1ed the
skill of men learned in the art of healing,
and defed all the remedies and restOra-
tives known to science. In ancient
times it was deemed incurable, and those
afflicted with it became hopeless out
casts, and were treated with the utmost
| aversion. So universal and deep rooted
has been this belief that to the present
| time person finally pronounced leper
| is considered dOOmed-absOlutely RENE
| dileSSlY doomed.
But is it not profanity, and an insult to
| a benefcent Creator and loving Father,
to assert that He would send an atfiiction
so horrible without providing a remedy?
| Such a belief is unreasonable; it is in
consistent with our conceptions OF God,
and with our experience. 1t would be
| hard to conceive a human parent SO de-
praVed, 80 devilish, as to be willing to
permit such a condition to exist. Be-
cause adequate remedies have not been
heretofore discovered; because the dis
ease has been surrounded with mys cries
and because the limits of human knOwl-
edge have not been attained, we accept
the conclusions OF the past and look upon
the result as inevitable.
l know that science is not satisfied,
and that there are devoted men who are
giving their lives to the solution OF the
great problem All honor to them and
| their high devotion. But how little,
apparently, has been contributed by the
physicians of these Islands to this great
end. | say apparently, for believe that
much more has been accomplished than
| is known to the world. The greater
number of the physicians engaged upon
| these Islands during the past twenty
| five years, and at present, have been
and are talented men; men whose train
| inc and ability qualify them to investi-
! gate the subject with understanding;
! the opportunities for observation and ex-
pertinent have been unexceptiOnal, and
| there must necessarily have been very
great variety in their experiences with
| the disease in its various stages and
under different conditions. But in all
these wears there has been no Organiza-
| ton or association among them; no
general conferences at which opinions,
observations and the results of expert
ments have been submitted. For the
most part each one has worked by him
| self, and kept to himself what he has
| learned. Perhaps many OF them would
say they had nothing new to state or
contribute; that they did not assume to
know more than their fellows.
But it is fact that there have been,
and are physicians whose .preconceived
ideas upon the subject of the incura-
bility of leprosy have been very much
shaken; and who are inclining to the
belief that under some conditions it may
be permanently cured. Facts and re-
suItS have produced SkepticiSm in re-
gard to the hoary dogma of incurabiIity.
In the face of historic, scientific and al
most universal opinion upon the subject
such men are slow to proclaim their ex-
periences until fully assured of the per-