Evening star., 1898-08-10
A Talk With DR.. Parham of New
Orleans.
GEN. SHAFTER'S REPORTS A PUZZLE
He Never Knew Such a Slight
Mortality With So Many Cases.
NO DAN NG ER FEA RED

Dr. f. w. Parham, an ex-official of the
louisiana board of health, now in Wash
ington, has been making a close and care
fui study of yellow fever conditions in
Cuba, as shown by the daily bulletin of
the crude returns Of General Shafter in
his brief and business-like statements sent
to the War Department. There is world
yet to explore in yellow fever, and the
wiser of the health officials throughout
the United States are prepared to read and
learn, and even to listen and learn when
ever the dread disease appears in any spot
on the globe. New Orleans is by common
consent regarded as the prime center of
yellow fever information whenever the
scourge has made its presence felt in the
United States, for it is in that city that
the vast majority of deaths have occurred.
and it is to the talented physicians of that
city that the medical authorities have
looked for any pronouncement as to the
Character of the disease, its spread, the
means Of prevention and the means of
cure. In 1873 no less than $500 people died
of yellow fever in New Orleans, and fully
1900 were stricken throughout the south.
A death rate of fully Is per cent estab-
lished the peculiarly fatal character of the
frightful visitation. Trade was utterly
paralyzed, shotgun quarantines' were es-
tabliShed and universal wreckage of the
state resulted. 1t is not a matter of sur
prise, therefore, that an ex-official of the
board of health in New Orleans should ex-
press some doubt as to the accuracy of
the figures which come from General Shat
ter at Santiago each twenty-four hours
with the regularity of well-regulated
clock
Doesn't Understand the Reports.
II notice" he said, that In his Satur-
day bulletin General Shafter says: Total
fever cases, g. 4o8; new cases fever, 696.'
He then proceeds to state that there was
one death, and that not from yellow fever.
OF course, such a statement amounts TO
little, because there are many fevers that
are not yellow fever, but IL is inconcefv-
able that the yellow fever exists TO any
extent when there is not a single death
from the disease in twenty-four hours. L
have no conception of a condition wmch
shows 8, 406 sick of fever, and but one fatal
termination in a day. Even bad colds snow
a higher rate Of mortality.
Il am inclined to believe that there Is
such a chaotic condition of affairs in the
neighborhood of Santiago that nobody
knows exactly how things stand. Physi-
clans who are Jumped up for the occa-
sion are not usually skillful, and few men
of ability can afford to leave their regular
practice for the pittance which army Ser
vice gives. The surgeon general of the
army and such men as DR.. Nicholas Sem
and Dr. John Guiteras are, of course, the
highest and best of authorities on yellow
fever, but they cannot be everywhere, nor
can they even supervise properly the crude
work of subordinates, who may be the YER
lest tyros in the medical profession. l no
ticc, by the way, that DIR. Guiteras has
left Cuba and Dr. Sem has expressed his
disapproval OF existing methods of hand
ling the sick during the Cuban campaign.
Who are diagnosing the cases, their compe-
tency, experience and general ability are
utterly unknown.
My experience with yellow fever in this
},
leads me to believe that the unaccIimated
die at twice the rate of the acclimated. In
New Orleans English cotton buyers, for
example, over here only for season, fell
early and easy victims to the disease Men
from Chicago. New York, Philadelphia
Washington and other northern and west
ern cities lie down and die when natives
seemed to suffer but a few days of ineon-
venience from the fever. 1t is all the more
surprising, therefore, when / read that the
troops at Santiago, largely recruited from
sections which have never known yellow
fever, recover rapidly from the disease
and that the death rate is but per cent
And to this date there has not been in the
dispatches the suggestion of a case of
olack Vomit in the total of 3, ,406 sick from
1eVer There Is great mistake some
Where. ere. There can really be no genuine
yellow fever in Santiago, or the rate of
mortality would be five times as large as
it is.
Theory Destroyed.
The correspondents of the large daIies,
who are on duty at Santiago, refer to that
city IS pest-hole the home of yellow
jack the cesspool of the island, where the
scourge ravages the Inhabitants every year
on account of unsanitary conditions Every
skagrant drain in the city is charged l,p
with its share of yellow fever, and each
reeking filth pool has a thousand germs of
the disease lurking i'll its bosom. Well all
this theory of filth being the necessary
handmaiden of yellow fever has been utter
ly destroyed. by our experience in New Or
leans Last year we had visitation and
three-fifths of the cases were in the gar
den district" corresponding to your north
west section. Italians living in squalor and
huddled together in ill-ventilated rooms