The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1894-08-23

The Board of Health met yester-
day afternoon, with President
Smith in the chair. There were
present Messrs Ena, Lansing and
Waterhouse, and Doctors Day,
Wood and Howard.
The Committee on Quarantine,
DR.. Day and J. J. Waterhouse,
Jr., reported as follows:
To Hon. W. O. SMITH, President of
Board of Health.
Your Committee on Quarantine and
Contagious Diseases, recognizing the
inadeQuacy of the present equipment
at the quarantine station 10 properly
disinfect vessels coming from infected
ports or with contagious diseases on
board, recommend that the Govern
ment be requested to take steps to
erect an efficient disinfecting plant.
The method at present employed
consists in placing eight or ten galvan-
lied iron buckets, each charged with
several pounds of birthstone, on the
floor of one of the buildings in which
the passengers effects are hung. The
birthstone is ignited, the doors closed
and the process allowed to take care
of itself for six or eight hours, when
the doors are opened, men rush in and
drag the smouldering buckets out of
the building. The effects are then
supposed to be clean.
The objections to this method are:
/. Sulphur dioXide is not as eff
cient as heat for purposes of disinfec-
ton.
2. The danger of fire. If a single
garment should happen to fall into
one of the buckets the whole building
and its contents would be destroyed.
8. The relatively small percentage
of sulphur diOXide thus obtained.
4. The risk to the individuals from
inhaling the irritating sulphur fumes.
5. There is no provision made for
the disinfectiOn of vessels and cargOes.
Under the present arrangement the
community has very little real pro
lection against invasion from such
deadly diseases as small pOX, cholera,
plague, yellow fever, etc.
What is needed to place the quaran-
tine station on scientific basis is q
hot-air chamber and accessories for
disinfecting clothing and dunnage,
sulphur furnace and accessories for
fumigating the holds andother inclOsed
spaces of vessels and the cargOes, and
a corrosive sublimate tank for flush
ing decks, bilgeS, closets, etc. In
short, such a plant as described in the
plans and specifications submitted to
the Board of Health by the Kensing-
ton Iron Works of Philadelphia, with
such notifications and alterations as
are necessary to adapt them to the
conditions present at the quarantine
station.
(Signedl F. r. DAY, MD,
J. r. WATERHOUSE, JR.
Honolulu, August %, 1894.
President Smith presented re-
port from A. W. Keech in the mat
ter of utilizing the old Kaimiloa as
disinfecting station. 1t was re-
ferred to the Committee on Quar-
antine.
President Smith said he had
spoken to Mr. Suhr about the arri-
val of the Belgic. The latter sug-
gested, if the Belgic arrived under
the same conditions as the Rio
Janeiro, that it would be a good
plan to moor her at the Mail
wharf, and to quarantine her there.
President Smith reported that all
the Government physicians had
asked to be re-appointed, and had
taken the oath, except DR.. McKib-
bon. He sent a letter, saying that
he had held his present position for
thirty-four years, and that he would
take no oath. President Smith said
he had seen DR.. McKibb0n, and had
told him it was not in the option Of
the Board to reappoinC him unless
he took the oath of allegiance.
Mr.. Lansing moved that all those
who asked to be recommissiOned,
have their new papers issued to
them on the approval of the Minis
ter Of the interior Carried.
President Smith said that DR..
Hatzopulos had been notified to
attend, but was not present.
Dr.. Oliver applied for a weeks
leave of absence. Granted.
Letters were read from Mr.. Mey-
ers, the superintendent of the leper
settlement. They contain nothing