The age-herald., 1900-05-24

before D. m."
 "Thou hast a fortunate birthday Tor thy
 business. and it will increase and prosper,
 but be careful of thy health. as sickness | threatens"
 "A child born on this day will meet much
 success and will rise rapidly in ife' yet It will spend it's money fast and so become l comparatively poor. If a female, she Will marry a kind, but unluelSy husband Bake bread"
 This is Ascension Day, or Holy Thursday, l one of the great festivals of liturgical 1 churches. It is observed in commemoration | of Christs ascension into heaven, forty l days after Easter. In the Catholic church | 1t is a day of obligation; that is to say | every Catholic is obliged to take part in
 mass unless unavoidably kept away. At l the Church of the Advent there will be
 services at 7:SO this morning, when Holy l Communion will be celebrated. At St. 1 Paurs church there will be mass at o:SO'
 and at o clock high mass will begin. fhere
 will be important announcements to the | congregation.
 l Many months ago it was estimated that l demic 15.OOO cases of smallpox, chiefly
 amongst the negroes, in Lowndes county
 and it is now estimated that 75 per cent.
 of the colored population of that county
 have suffered from the disease, one doctor 1 holding that 90 per cent. of the negroes
 in his immediate locality have been so af-
 ficted," said Dr. w. H. Sanders, Alabamas
 busy and able state health officer, last | with
 the St. Clair County Medical society at l Springville and consulted with the doctors
 regarding the prevalent smallpox in some
 districts of that county. Smallpox con tinues to hang on and arouse much trouble | in many counties of the state, Dr. Sanders
 proceeded to say; "and the disease cannot | be effectually dealt with without additional
 legislation It was my duty to endeavor to | secure some absolutely necessary leglsia-
 ton by the general assembly during it's last
 session, but, unhappily, my efforts failed
 Amongst enactments I urged upon the leg l islature was one which I considered most
 important, fixing the minimum salaries of | county health officers. graded according to
 population, and compelling county commits | sioners and boards of revenue to pay such
 salaries. As matters stand, health officers
 
 pay. Lowndes county, for instance, which | formerly paid it's health officer $500 year,
 and which for time enjoyed the constant | and skilled services of such a man as Dr.
 Shirley Bragg, now pays $25 a year, or
 nothing, you may say Other counties may
 pay s1O year. This is worse than absurd; 1 it is downright recklessness. All doctors,
 as a rule, are glad to give their services | for tba alxp of
 there must be some reason excuse for it. l Doctors have to earn their living. There'is
 no law and no sense of justice or common | fairness requiring them to work for noth-
 ing. Another matter I urged upon the leg | islature was to compel the vaccination of every child attending any sort of school
 in the state. General compulsory vaccina- l ton Is really essential, but reasonably paid health officers and the vaccination of all | school children, would in measure lessen the danger of an epidemic of smallpox like that from which Alabama has been sorely suffering for more than three years past"
 "The duties expected of a county health officer are burdensome at best and he should receive something like reasonable compensation to enable him to do the work
 and make living at the same time," con- tinued the distinguished health officer of | the state. Not only are the county health officers required to preserve in so far as | possible the public health, but they required to obtain and report full and com plete vital and mortuary statistics. That in itself entails great amount of labor, and continuous watehfulness. But all this | is impossible to expect of a free, over | worked doctor. for the doctor has got to secure living for himself and his family. | It is unfair and utterly nonsensical to ex- | pect any doctor to work for nothing all | the tme
 "They have wise laws and provisions re- l gardng such matters in Ireand," remarked | an observant man who had resided in that l country. "The law establishes what are | called poor law unions, the affairs of | which are conducted by poor law guard | ians, who are men elected for that pur- | pose. The dimensions and populations of 1 unions vary, according to needs and general | circumstances; but as nearly the center of l each union as may be is a medical dispens- | ary attended by a public doctor, all the | expenses of which are paid out of the poor l rates on taxes At each dispensary is an | accurate record of every person in the | union who is not in positio1 to pay for | medicine or medical attendance, and every | such person is entitled to medicine and to l the doctors services without charge or fee of any sort. The dispensary doctor is re- | quired to collect, preserve and report all vital and mortuary statistics, to look after the general health conditions of his union or district, and to be watchful as to sani- | tary matters. Vaccination being compul- | sorry, he sees that every person is vaccin- | ated. The law requires that every infant, l on arriving at certain age, say three | months, shall be vaecinated, and so record
 ed in the dispensary doctors books, where | all births and deaths likewise recorded. | The urban or rural police the case may | be, examine these records, and if it be | found that any infant of proper age has not | been vaccinated, the child's parents are