The Saint Paul globe., 1902-12-21
LEARNING TO BE CLEAN.

The session in this city within the past
few days of the Minnesota State :Sani-
tary association ought to be followed
by practical results. No person who
followed the published reports of the
association can fail to have seen that
the educational value of the session
was great, but that it's practical utility
is liable to be very little. In order to
avoid this result it will be necessary
for the association or it's representa-
tives to force the adoption of it's pre-
cautions by the public through the
agency of health officials, local and
state.
DR.. H. L. Taylor;@of st. Paul, made
very sensible. suggestion when he de-
clared in his address that it should be
made a crime for any physician, or
the head of asfarnily or of public in
stitution to fail to report the existence
of any known case of consumption. 1t
most rigid requirements exist as to
the reporting of cases of other infec-
tious diseases, such as smallpox. diph-
iberia and scarlet fever, there is no OBJ
legation, even on the, attending physi-
clan, to do anything whatever to ad-
wise the public in cases of consumption.
Such being the case, it is unquestion-
ably true that we thus set premium
on the spread of this terrible disease.
Gradually and very slowly, but stead
i1xy on
which the rights of society will secure
protection against infectious disease
and its main operating causes. Many
will regard the warnings given by the
delegates to the meeting of the sanitary
association against prevailing practices,
such as the swearingeof trailing skirts,
as mere affectation.. 1t has always
been so; but it is less SO today than
ever before. In time more or less
short we Will put all such uncleanly
habits on plane,sand will regard the
woman who sweeps the streets with
her skirt as in the same order of men
tai and moral development as the man
who spits in paahie=Yehicles and other
public places.
The first great step in the direction
of the control of tuberculosis will be
the establishment of asylums for the
treatment of consumptives in this state.
Thanks to the few public sanitarians
who have really been in earnest we
have made advances in many valuable
directions. Thanks to DR.. Ohage the
inspection of dairy cattle is no longer
a mere pretense. Thanks to him, too,
we have come near to taking the col
lection of garbage out of politics, and
have seen called into existence the
public sentiment necessary to regard
ing the man who. pollutes the sidewalk
with his spittle as vulgar and un-
clean.
When effective quarantine is enforc-
ed in all cases of infectious diseases
there will be left, as the sources of,
such diseases, only unclean practices
on the part of the individual citizen to
guard against, such as the soiling of
the sidewalks with splitting, the wear
ing of the trailing skirt, unsanitary
conditions in plumbing and other
household arrangements and the other
wise uncleanly habits of, the individual.
1t is the duty of every intelligent man
and woman here and elsewhere to fight
against such habits as are productive
of disease; and the greatest aid which
can be given to such disposition on
their part is to be looked for from the
operations of such bodies as the Min
nesota State Sanitary association which
has justsclosed it's session in this city.