Evening star., 1899-07-29
General Woods Determined Battle
Against Yellow Jack.
BE HAS ALREADY WORKED WONDERS
Insists Upon Temperance and a
Most Rigid Quarantine.
SALVATION OF SANTIAGO

Copyrighted by the s. s. Mcclure Co, 1s9o)
Written for The Evening Star
When yellow fever is wiped out of Cuba,
especially out of Havana and Santiago, it
will be wiped out of the United States.
Yellow fever does not originate in this
country. Every epidemic which the south
ern states have known has been started by
the Importation of cases from Cuba. These
epidemics have cost more than thousand
lives year for many years, and often ten
times that number during a single vista
tion The money expenditure which has
been necessary to keep up national quar-
antines and the commercial loss which has
resulted from state quarantines have
amounted up in the scores of millions.
This indicates the immense Importance of
the work which is now being done by our
American military officers in Cuba toward
the wiping out of the disease.
Brig. Gen. Guy V. Henry, former gov
ernor of Porto Rico, and who is now in
the United States on waiting orders gave
as his opinion, based on his experience in
Porto Rico, that 1t was absolutely impoSsi-
bic to keep yellow fever out of Santiago
this summer.
Has Worked Wonders.
General Wood has certainly worked
wonders in cleaning and administering
Santiago he said in the course of a con-
yersation, but he must have realized that
1T was hopeless task far as keeping
the city free from fever is concerned. Yels
low Jack has had an abiding place there for
2Oo years, and it is not possible that few
months of sanitary precautions could
counteract the effect of all that period.
yellow fever is something that no man
can guard against with any certainty 1t is
the accepted theory that the disease is con-
tracted through the inhalation of germs
inE
Everything depends on the condition of the
system. II a man is run down or enervat-
ed by excesses or through climatic causes
he is very apt to contract fever Still, there
are cases known where men in vigorous
health and entirely abstemious in habits
have been carried off with a Ightnings
stroke The disease attacks men, women
and children impartially, but it must be
confessed that victory generally rests with
those who are careful and temperate
The precautions now being taken by
General Wood and the plan he is following
seem entirely correct. From all appear
anceS, however, the task he has before him
Is by no means easy.
Victims of the Fever.
Yellow fever has existed in Santiago de
Cuba under the misnomer of "pernicious
malaria" since the surrender of the city
last July. Americans-soldiers and civilians
have died of it, cases have filled the fever
hospital across the bay from Santiago and
other cases a-plenty have been sent home
corvalescent to recuperate in the more
healthful climate of the United States.
In Santiago nowadays the term ''pernici-
Gus malaria is a byword. 1t is now known
down there that fully sixty per cent of
those who suffered from it during the lat
ter months of 1898 were really victims of
the dread yellow scourge in more or less
mild form. Tho fact that their hospital
papers bore the words .pcrnicious malaria
dld not serve to lessen the peril of the pa
tients, but it prevented the danger of a
panic and helped materially in the recon-
struction and publication of the city
And that was why General Leonard
Wood, military and civil governor of San
tago de Cuba. knowingly and with pre-
meditation. successfully concealed the fact
that yellow fever existed within the con-
fines of the province.
That General Wood fully Anticipated the
present outbreak is beyond question. He
knew that fever would return in force this
summer despite all that medical skill and
sanitary precautions could do TO prevent it
Interview With Gen. Wood.
"1t is as impossible to carry American
troops and civilians through the hot tropi-
cal months of June, July and August with
out number Of fatalities from yellow fever
as 1t would be to stop a Mauser bullet with
out being hurt he said to the writer last
October
Il say it is impossible to entirely escape"
lie ddded, Dut, please God, we will do
everything in the power of man to reduce
the casualties as much possible If we
succeed in cutting the regular annual rec
ord of deaths one-half, or even one-fourtb
| shall be satisfied
That everything "in the power of man"
has been done to keep the scourge from San
tiago since General Wood assumed charge
Is q matter of common fame. There are
some men who might have felt DISCOURAGED
when confronted with the task that faced
General Wood last July. 1t only spurred
him on. With the indonitable force of will
ana energy characteristic of the man he
threw himself into the work of cleansing
and purifying the city.
The situation appealed to him from two