The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1894-04-06
THE PASSING OF CHOLERA.
1t May Never Again Amount to q Plague in
Any Civilized Land

Any Civilized Land.
DR.. Klein, f. r s., lecturer on gen.
eral anatomy and physiology at Bar
tholomew's hospital, delivered a lecture
on cholera at the London institution
recently.
The lecturer said that the proven tion
of cholera was beset with less difficulty
than that of some of the communicable
diseases which in towns we had almost
constantly among us He quoted an
account by Mr.. Ernest Hart of the
great religious festival of Kumbh fair
of Hardwar. town on the Gauges, at
which, in 1891, eight hundred thousand
to one million pilgrims assembled. In
the opinion of many experienced
officials the most complete sanitary
arrangement would be powerless to
prevent the spread of cholera if the
fair was allowed to take place. The
pilgrims coming from cholera-infected
districts brought the infection with
them, and two people died at Hardwar
during the most crowded period. Ow-
ing. however, to the excellent and
stringent sanitary precautions the in
lection did not spread. No more cases
arose in the town or camp, nor did the
disease develop on the track of the dis
persing pilgrims That was unques-
tionably one of the most remarkable
and brilliant achievements of santa
ton in the whole history of cholera
Not only in India, but also in Europe,
had it been demonstrated that cholera
was a preventable disease. In 1892
cholera broke out in Hamburg. The
insanitary conditions of its dock
and port population. and the polluted
supply of drinking water, brought
for Hamburg the long predicted
day of reckoning. In former years
the establishment of such focus
of cholera at Hamburg, which had vast
communications and intercourse with
the whole of Germany, would have
been followed by innumerable foci of
cholera all over Germany. Yet there
was the remarkable fact that, with the
exception of few cases in limited
number of towns, Germany did not suf-
fer from any further epidemic out
breaks.
And the same fact was illustrated in
1899 in a perhaps more striking manner
in England. Sir John Simon had years
back insisted on the Importance of con-
sidering cholera and also typhoid fever
as a filth disease. 1t had since become
an axiom in sanitary science to isolate
the patient, to disinfect or destroy all
articles soiled by him to prevent such
filth from gaining access to drinking
water and to articles of food, and to in
sist that the hands that had been in
contact with such soiled articles should
be scrupulously cleaned In order to
avoid self-;nfection; in short, to pre-
vent and to avoid the contagion being
swallowed. By carrying out these pre-
ospts it had become possible to prevent
the spread of cholera epidemically, and
this had been successfully accom-
plished-
This success implied two things
(frst) the locality before the introduo-
ton of case of cholera should be in
proper sanitary condition, and (second)
on the appearance of a case of cholera
the measures for isolation and disin-
lection should be at once put in pra O
tice There should be no attempt at
hiding or ignoring; but the fact should
be openly and boldly rec ognized and
action taken according ly.-London
Times