Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1894-10-18
FILTERED WATER IS SAFE
Bacteria That Pass Sand
Beds Are Harmless.
VERY IMPORTANT DISCOVERY
The Work of Massachusetts
Experts. -.
Results of Operations of the Filter Plant
at Lawrence, Mass, Show to Marked
Degree the Value of the FllterIng
Method of Treating the Water Supply
of n City-Experiments By the state
board of Health of Massach usetts.

The Philadelphia Record says the
latest results determined by the remark.
able experiments which have been con-
Quoted by tho Massachusetts State
Board of Health during the past seven
years, and the one which will have an
important bearing upon the subject of
water publication, is that all disease-
producing germs found in drinking
water are removed by the method of
treatment by slow filtration through
sand. Some years ago the eminent
German investigators, Franckl and
Pickle, showed that filtration, under
capable management, removed as much
as $3.50 per cent of the bacteria found
in water. 1t failed to take out all the
germ life, unless the rate of filtration
was so slow as to deprive the system of
its value for practical purposes. Mr..
George W. Fuller, the biologist in
charge of the station at Lawrence, Mass,
now asserts, in paper read before the
Montreal meeting OF the American
Public Health Association, that only
the non-pathogenic bacteria tlnd their
way through the filters, the germs of
disease early succumbing to the I'M
favorable conditions found in the sand
beds.
In regard to the latest deductions
from the Lawrence experiments, Mr..
Fuller says: "Out of 102 analyses, So
indicated that the filtered water was alb
solutely sterile. Furthermore, the few
bacteria which were found in the efflu-
ent from time to time belonged to the
most hardy species of water bacteria,
many of which existed in the form of
| spores, and which, let it be understood,
are net killed by the ordinary applica-
ton of heat or of chemicals. Spring
water obtained from favorable sources
| has repeatedly been found to be abso-
lutely sterile. This is the result OF
| natural filtration. This is natures
method of purifying water, and the
efficiency of natural filtration may be
attributed to the retention of the bac-
terra within the filter under an unfavor-
| able environment. The natural conse-
quence of these unfavorable conditions
is the survival of the tittest. Now, the
evidence at hand shows that the disease
| producing bacteria are among the first
to succumb, because farthest removed
from their natural habitat"
AN EXPERTS VIEW OF FILTRATION.
The experiments made by the Massa-
chusetts State Board of Health, aud the
| practical results which have been
achieved in the filtration plant con
structed upon the lines of its investiga-
tons to purify the water supplied to the
citizens of Lowell, lead Mr.. Fuller to in
dorse the system of slow filtration
through sand as productive of very sat-
isfactory results in practice. In speak
ing of the three methods of sterilizinc
water supplies, by means OF chemicals,
heat and filtration, he says: "While
chemicals have been of much aid in
surgery by bringing about antisepsis
and asepsis, it is very improbable that
people would allow their drinking
water to be drugged with chemicals
even with a view to removing danger
GUS bacteria. Indeed, such a method
might prove very dangerous in many
cases. Heat is a much safer means oil
sterilization, and its application in the
household has undoubtedly done much
good, but on the ground of practicability
and economy, as well asgos reliability
in the light of our present knowledge
each of these methods of sterilization
for the removal of disease. producing
germs from water supplies drops into
relative insigniiicance when compared
with filtration"
NATURES METHOD OF PURIFYING
WATER.
The evidences of bacterial life are
plainly visible in all hygienic processes
which are carried on by nature, and the
important work performed by these
minute organisms in protecting the liv,
ing from the dead" cannot be overesti
mated. Of tho countless myriads Of
these bacteria found in water, it is only
those which are the result of disease
process in the human system that are
dangerous. When nature starts to purify
water of these disease producing germ.
her method is by intermittent applica,
ton of the water to sand or earth IN
rates equal to the rainfall. Tue econo
mic adaptation of sand filtration, par,
ticularly as it has been practiced fol
many decades in Europe, differs from
natures method, strictly speaking, ir
that the rate of filtration is much higher
and the surface of the sand or soil i!
covered with water for long periods o.
time. The essential underlying prin
ciples, however, are the same, becaus,
the results are produced by bacteria
activity which permanently exists in al
tilterng materials.
"While the removal of pathogenit
bacteria by chemicals, including c0agu
lants, and by heat, will forever be di
rectly dependent upon human attention
and judgment" says Mr.. Fuller,"I vent
ure to predict that the day will com,
when the knowledge of filtration among
sanitary scientists will be such tina
filters may be constructed and operated
by which water, free from objection
able bacteria, will be supplied to hun
dreds Of thousands of citizens, and re
qulre the attention of mere handful
of men. Even under these circum
stances the opportunity for exercising
personal attention and Judgment can bt
reduced to very narrow limits. In til,
publication of water, that method i!
safest which follows most closely
Natures method, and which is least de
pendent on human agencies"
DESTROYING TYPHOID GERMS.
The results of the operations of til,
filter plant at Lawrence exhibit to
marked degree the value of this methot
OF treating the water supply of cit,
which is subjected to the sewage pollu
ton of larger communities. During the
five years preceding the use OF the filte
at Lawrence the average annual dealt
rate from typhoid fever in the city wa
1877 per 1000 inhabitants The popuia
ton of Lawrence is $4,000, and thi
average rate is equivalent to 63 aetna
deaths per year from this cause alone
During the past year, with lilteret
water, there have been 26 deaths from
tYphOid favnr a rRdnntinn of 80 ne