Omaha daily bee., 1893-11-19
MrNIclplL SANITATION.

MUNTCfPAL SANITATION.
In a contribution to the current num-
Der of the Forum, DR.. John S. Billings
endeavors to explain the relations trace
able between the mortality statistics for
New York city and Brooklyn and the
sanitary arrangements OF those cities.
Variations in death rates are, OF course,
not necessarily due TO differences in the
sanitary conditions OF the locality. They
arise from inere differences of race,
which account for some of the
variations in figures relating to
negroes and to whites. Among the
whites they arise from differences
of nationality, of occupation, of density
of population. While, therefore, the
causes of varying mortality tables can
not be ascribed TO sanitation alone, yet
that sanitation has much to do with the
variations can and has been readily
shown by comparing the statistics for
the same race and nationality located in
city and country and in different parts
of the same city.
According to DR., Billings, the in
lllltIlICS vi bhC tiiIACib bNpOSi ophy Va
these two cities, long since modi-
fled by artificial means, are still
plainly discernible. Old marshes
and streams, the very existence
of which has for years been forgotten by
those who pass daily over their former
sites, still indicate their effects upon the
healthfulness of the people who dwell in
,l-,. ,,a,ar1 In.,AAl Atnnn fhn.nl1nh
drainage and reconstruction of such
iilled-in streams could not but react
favorably upon the death rates Of the
residents.
In other directions the sanitary work
of the municipal government is positive
and constantly repeated, although as
| yet far from that perfection which it
should by this time have attained.
The water supply is n of the
most important branches. In this
| purity is the first requisite and
abundance the second. Our large cities
are almost all severed cities, but the
complaint is made in regard to New York
sewers that they are III many places of
faulty construction, are too level, or are
leaky and pollute the soil. Hospital ac-
commodations for contagious diseases
are fair and the health departments are
we'll equipped with disinfecting appara-
tus, which they attempt to put to sys-
tematic use. They also employ a large
number of sanitary inspectors who arc
chiefly employed in examining the
dwellings, of the tenement house dis
trict. Yet many, many forms OF
un~cleanliness defy their most strenuous
efforts at repression. A final field OF
sanitary activity of the municipality
consists in cleaning the streets. How
far neglect or defective work in this re-
gard has an influence upon the mortality
rate is not ~ascertainable from the stats.
tics at hand. That accommodations of de
caying organic matter to be blown
hither and thither by the winds tend tc
increase the death rate is most certain
even if it has o been proven.
When we read that the annual death
rate in New York city is about 26 pei
1000 we are wont to accept it as an i'm
mutable law that about twenty-six per
sons in each 1000 of the inhabitants mus
die each year. But there is no law tina
any particular twenty-siX shall die nor i
that law so immutable that the average
may not be reduced by mans exertions
1t is the duty of each person to see, s.
far as he is able, that he is not one O
the twenty-siX, and it becomes the dut,
of the city government to endeavor t
reduce the number below twenty six. A
a matter Of fact the death rate in Ne,
York has. decreased from 1886 to lS9
from tw~enty-seven to t~wenty-six, and i
is fair to assume that improved santa
ton has had some influence in bringin
about that result. May we not expec
the sanitary science of the near futur
to make residence in the city on tn
whole no less healthy than residence i
, the country?