Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-02-18
FR5T oaPTAL FOX CoH5vHPTvEs IN HMERrck
CooN CoUHrT LIMOS

port sets tie ponderous quarantine systems
81 4 dozen governments at work. y case OF
yellow fever in Central America sends Il
Shivcr OF apprehension around the globe.
But medical authorities are agreed that the
world has seen its last great epidemic OF
either cholera yellow fever. These dis
eases are booming milder and milder and
quarantine methods throttle them in their
incipien,y ! But no dIminution of vlrulence
has been marked in tuberculosis. No quar-
s,ntin- has ever been made effective against
y. Yet Prof. Leyden is quoted as an au-
thpriry for the statement that at any given
time in Germany 1.3t0.OO9 persons are af-
fiic ted with tuberculosis. and Osier that in
America 1.SHtODo have that disease at all
times In the swaytrg crowds of New
York and Chicago one person in every fifty
has tuberculosis No specific has been dis
covered for its treatment. The world is
Hpathetic toward the ravages of the dis
ease. Compulsory vaccination against
smallpox - insisted upon all over the civil
ItZed world. hut today the medical profess
sion Is hampered by the knowledge that
were the specific for tuberculosis known
the world would not be ready TO avail it
selt of the discovery.
Cure VIII Be Found.
But that specific will he discovered in
sists Prof W. A Evans, chief of staff in
the new Chicago hospital for consumptiyes
We have found the germ: we know its
habitat; under what conditions it thrives
ami under what conditions it deteriorates
The medical profession is awake 10 the
evils Of tuberculosis and ii is closing in on
1t In a way that makes absolutely certain
the discovery of cure for tuberculosis.
But before that cure is established the
world must have learned its lesson. 1t will
learn 1t. too The forces are in nand now
which shall! press the trIth home to the
uttermost parts of the earth.f
-Four hundred years before Christ Dhthisis
WIS described ny Hippocrates in a manner
10 command the admiration OF the physi-
CLin Of today. Some of his observations in
td,tt remote age stand unchareugel after
2.Hp years Galen knew the disease ard
1Jded knowledge of IL to medical history
Niliemin proved the infectious nature of If
10 the French Academy Of Medicine on De
ccnber 1. 1850 Seventeen years later Prof
hoch discovered the bacillus which gives
lie 10 II, thus marking the greatest epoch
IN the history of tuberculosis
Prof. Hirsch, Who has deIved deep into
ms most formidable of all diseases af-
III ting the human family, SAYS: II is en-
phdtically disease Of all times all conn
tries and all races. No climate. no latitude
80 occupation. no combination Of favorins
circumstances forms an infaIlible safeguard
against the onset OF tuberculosis however
hhch The condfttorS may mitigate its raw
ages ar retst-d its progress. Like typhoid
fever. phthiSis dogs the steps of man wher-
ever h may be found, and claims its vic
''l'i@ among every age, class and race"
Where TuhercnIosIs is Rave.
There are favoring ATTITUDES AID condi-
Iceland. in the New Hebrides and in the
shetland Islands. The Persian plateau. the
plains of Syria and the walled precincts of
jerusalem are nearly free from it. Among
the Bedouin Arabs and the nOmads OF the
russian steppes. phthiss Is almost un-
known; but when these wild people come
under the influences Of civilization they die
rapidly from it, ravazes
In ike degree other parts OF the earth
are conducive 10 Dhthisis. In northern
Greenland II is the most common cause of
DEATH and in the Hawaiian Islands il is
estimated that two-fifths OF the deaths
from all causes are from tuberculosis.
Straus - authority for the statement
that tuberculosis Is the least contagious of
the germ diseases. AT the same time the
influence OF civilization make for its dis
serination. TIE death rate from II in
Vr"wtied cities is far greater to popuIa ton
tEstn II Is in country districts In Berlin
lJp0 persons die every year from tubar-
culGSls; IN Paris. 4.Ot8 lives are sacrificed
10 IL. while in Chicago, 1850 victims are
numbered The awful significance of these
figures "a better understood when IN is
pointed out. as does Bertillon. that in each
1860 deaths from tuberculosis, 7e0 our of
The number aro between the ages of twenty
and Sky years-the bread-winners and the
h.nle-nakers OF the world.
Garry the Germs.
The most common conveyancss for the
bacilli OF tuberculosis are dust particles in
the air and the milk from cows suffering
with the disease. Through the air, the
ierm from dried sputum finds Judgment I'm
hing tissues and pulmonary tuberculosis or
consumption IL the result From milk. the
germ causes tuberculosis of the digestive
organs. In either case the duration of the
disease Is from two to three years
Gfyen a case Of tuberculosis, the pa.