Waterbury Democrat., 1900-10-20
TYPHOID FEVER.


 The season of typhoid fever is at hand. The season of malarial fever is now well advanced and until late in the fall both diseases will be preya- lent. Deaths from the latter are rare in comparison with the former. We rarely find the pernicious type of mal- aria that southern physicians speak of. While the symptoms are as ac- tive yet we seldeh have a case here in the north that would not yield to treatment. Complications are gener ally the obstacle to recovery. There is a great similarity. between typhoid and malarial feAers during the first the physiciaR is unable to give a positive diagnosis until about seven days after the onset of fever. One positive differenef between malaria and typhoid is that the former can be aborted or broken up'' as the express sion commonly puts it. Typhoid fever cannot be broken up,'' stayed or shortened in it's course. So don't be- lieve it, should any of the local phy sicians tell you. Some have told it in the past and, still continue to do so. A case of so-called typhoid which has been ''broken up'' is nothing more seri- II.
 There are different degrees of ty- phOid some running a course of two weeks or from that up to ten weeks. What is the cause of typhoid fever? It is due to a germ which attacks the glands of certain portion of the bow els and poison develops which infects the whole system. CpOn the degree of infection depends the duration of the disease, and upon the general soundness of the heart. lungs and kid neys does the physician look to as a coadjutor to his treatment. The dis ease affects young adults as rule, al- though children ior old people develop it. Fat or alcoholic subjects do poor ly. The best subject is the slim, tenn perate individual. The serious symp- toms of hemDrfhaae and perforation of the bowels are thh cause of much an- guish and worry to the physician No man can tell during the course of case when tlsDse Owill occur, >conse- quently. the necessity of a very acute and observing physician and intelli- gent nursing. 4S*fTi
 The present season has yielded a large number of cases and there have been many ofithe deeply comatose and hemorrhagic types seen. The mortal ity is always, extremely high in the lat ter variety. The unusually dry season of the past two months accounts for the great prevalence, drinking water, both in wells and running streams having to- SCOUT out. the soil and thus be brought iH closer proximity to the widely prevalent typhoid germ.
 It is an old idea that typhoid fever is contacious,a and there are undoubt- ealv many neonle still of that opinion. 1t is an infectious disease, or, to ex- plain: 1nfection means to gain entrance to the system through the medium of food or drink. Contagion means to gain entrance to the system by mere proximity, as by breath ing the air of room or district in which is contained such germs as malaria, .diphtheria, etc. Close prox- unity to typhoid fever patient will nev"r infect an individual
 Visitors in the sick room of a ty- phOIu Lever patient have been seen to tremble and grow pale with fear, but all those old fashioned ideas are fast waning. ~1a ff .- ..- .-.-
 The physician lis often asked if he cannot "break up an attack, tanother old idea whicH is fast losing color), but there are doctors who claim to do SO, but they too, happily, are losing color and patients.
 It is a disease, which may infect and prostrate person again and again, that is, one attack does not render inn munity In this it is like its more acute neighbof, pneumonia which pro- duces a fresh sickness at every new infection with the specific germ.
 Epidemicsl of typhoid occur frequent ly but theirHappBarance is rare now, since the public In general is more ed ucated to the sanitary laws and pre- vention of disease, and, as conse- Quence, most cases met with are iso- lated ones, on confined only to one or two houses in the same district The epidemic at Maidstone, England. a cou- pie of years ago, when a village of about 5000 was almost completely prostrated. was the most disastrous in the history of the modern world, com paratively sneaking.
 Our neighboring village Forestville
 had upwards of forty cases confined to a few streetss This is of recent date, occurring oply last spring. The infective source was traced to q water pipe which supplied those streets where
 the disease prevailed. 1t seems thai this water pipe crossed the bed of q small stream which flowed through f the village. During the spring, wher the ice broke up, it is presumed the
 pipe was jammed and broken, (subse quently this was found true), thus al l lowing the river water which was con 3 taminated with typhoid, to pass into
 the supply pipe. A factory farther uI y the stream discharged sewage into thu: stream, and while no individual cas' 9 could he traced there, the suppositiol s was undoubtedly true that Forestvill' D owed it's epidemic to the sewage dis
 charged from this mill. The mortality of typhoid fever aver ! ages from 5 to 30 per cent, dependen n on the treatment. Medical scienc I has not yet reached the acme of per . lection in the positive diagnosis of tn disease during the first few days l. neither has a specific treatment beel a discovered, so the intelligent physician f treats his cases symptomatically. ! +,...~- rrAnns TIT DA ccrMH