The morning call., 1892-08-25
THE RECORD OF THE DEAD.

The Health Officer reports an increased
mortality for the year ending June so, 1892,
which he ascrIbes to the spread of grip or
Influenza 1t was during the year 1S9O-91
that this annoying disease was most preva-
lent, not in 1892, and DIR. keeney's
opinion is thus not easily reconcilef with
the facts. 1t seems more likely that the
69l1 deaths in the latter year. as against
6650 in 1S90-91, were due 10 increased Sc
verify in other diseases. The doctor
assumes the city population to be $50, 600,
and on this gives the percentage of deaths
as 20.94 The Census Commissioner found
less than 100000 people in the city in $780,
and there can hardly have been an increase
of 10 per cent in eighteen months. The per-
centage reported at the Health Office is thus
probably below the truts.
One-halt the deaths which occurred in
San Francisco in 1891 92-Or 34SS out Of
6911-were caused by 'Iscal diseases" Tn
der this heading are in suded pneumonia,
heart disease, bronchtlis, liver disease.
Brighi's disease. brain fisease. and num-
Der of maladies which, do not fall under
other classifeations. C{ the other half of
the deaths of 1891 90, oae-third were due to
zymotic disease, one-thsrd to constitutional
disease, and the othef third to develop
mental disease and Violence. 1t is under
the head OF zym0tic disease that diphtheria
and typhoid fever are cIasSed; they have
always been the cause of considerable NOR
tally in the city. though under the strict
system OF quarantine enforced by the
Health Department deaths from diphtheria
are now less frequent than they were. In
the case of this fatal disease isolation is the
only method by which its spread can be
checked; it ought perhaps to be more rigdly
enforced than it is. The period of incuba-
ton Is so long that it is always difficult to
determine when the danger OF infection or
contagion has passed.
Consumption and cancer come under the
head of constitutional diseases; the former
Is Of all diseases the most fatal on this
coast, as indeed it is In most countries. One
thousand people, in round numbers, die of
consumption every year in San Francisco,
and the saddest feature in the case is shat
! after the early stages of the disease are
| passed there is no cure known 10 science.
| The ableSt minds in medicine nave coneen-
| trated their attention on consumption for
| many years, and the discovery of a number
of empirical remedies has been periodically
announced with much flourish af trumpets
but we are just as far from being able 10
cure genuine tuberculosis in the advanced
stages as we were in the days of good old
DR.. Buchan. There is some comfort in re-
membering that in the early stages Of the
disease outdoor life in the Sierras will en-
able nature IN perhaps q majority Of cases
10 close the tu0erceS and renoyate the
blood. But there must be no delay in re-
sorting 10 this cure. When a certain stage
has passed the case is beyond the reach Of
aid. II has been believed from time inl-
memorial that consumption is an hereditary
disease, Transmitted from parents to Off
spring. and in some countries il has been
| proposed to check its spread by prohibiting
the marriage of persons in whose family
| phthisis had appeared. But quite recently
| the hereditary character of consumption
has been denied by physicians OF standing.
! Il is certain that many consumptiYes are
| the progeny of healthy parents. and on the
| other hand that men and women who in
| their youth have had tuberculosis aud have
recovered have often had healthy children.
Whether any disease is bereditary-eyen
| insanity-is a question that is by no means
| settled. 1t would seem that where the
| morbifc principle is not actively at work IL
| the parent when the child is born the
| theory Of heredity cannot be accepted
| without more evidence than existing books
contain.
| nual report Of the Health Officer will con-
tain record OF deaths from Asiatic cholera.
| The Health Board Of New York expresses
confident hope that no case of cholera
| VIII be able to get beyond the quarantine
Island, andsDT Edison. referring to the brief
| period Of incubation in cholera, says that
there ought not TO be any cases in the East
eTn metropolis. These utterances are well
| enough as calculated TO check panic; but
| when il is observed that the disease Jumps
| from ST. Peters burg to Hamburg and from
| the Volga to Moscow, public faith In the
| efficacy OF quarantine is shaken. Ii Is al
! most impossible to resist the impression
| that the bacillus of cholera travels in the
| air out OF reach of human eye, over human
| barriers and without regard to distances.
| The evidence that in former visitations of
| the epidemic the disease was carried hither
| or thither in clothing or the trunks of pa
| tients will not stand the test of legal exami-
| nation. and We are left to make the best of
the naked fact that when the plague pre-
vailed IN the East it gradually worked its
| way westward through channels and by
| agencies to US unknown. The only consol-
atOry feature In the case Is that the present
| epidemic is mild in comparison with its
| predecessors. The mortality even in the
| Black Sea and in Northern Russia has been
comparatively light 1t is quite possible
| that the disease may wear itself out before
| it crosses the American continent
4
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