The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1903-09-23
AND
LEPROSY
Results of English In
vestigations in
India.

it was due chiefly to eating badly pre-
served fish
Various persons have said to ne
over and over again: Leprosy disap-
pears before civilization; you need not
trouble yourself about fish," says DR..
Hutchinson. MY reply is that it re-
cedes under many conditions of ed
vancing civilization, but not under all.
For instance, there is plenty of leprosy
in the West Indian islands and in
Spain and Portugal, while in Cape Col
ony it is steadily advancing, and if
there are benefits to be derived from
mere segregation Cape Colony ought to
have felt them. The advocates of the
fish theory allege broadly that the one
factor Of Importance in the decline of
leprosy is the disuse of badly preserved
fish and that the advance of civiliza-
ton acts by supplying different articles
of food and thus diminishing the con-
sumption of bad fish.
81 have often been asked why de-
composing meat might not also be a
cause of leprosy as well as decompos-
ing fish, and the reply is that there are
many communities in which it has long
been habitual to eat decomposing meat
but in which no leprosy occurs. A
Kaffir in Natal will eat the flesh of
dead OK, however advanced in decom-
position it may be, but from time i'm
memorial they had no leprosy in Natal
until they had communication with
Cape Colony, where the people eat salt
fish, and that is within the last sixty
years. The fish hypothesis assumes
that really fresh fish and really well
preserved fish are both alike innocuous
and that cured or uncured fish in COM
mencing decomposition may occasion
ally contain ingredients which become
effective in the causation of leprosy.
1t is not the excessive use of fish but
the accidental reception of a specific
ingredient in connection with fish
which determines the occurrence of the
disease. The belief that leprosy is COM
municated by direct Inheritance was
entirely discredited by the evidence of
the commission and there is very much
other evidence which leads \us to at
tach no Importance to the belief that it
is so communicated. The hypothesis
of commensalism is very much more
plausible. At Lahore I saw a baker
who came among the general out-pa-
tents of the hospital for advice because
he had got very sore hands and this
was a great impeachment to him in max
ing bread. He was leper unquestion-
ably and his hands had leper's sores
upon them. We can see at once the
possibilities of contagion in that direc-
ton.
Having made these explanations. I
now proceed to my argument, one point
of which will be that there is no part
of India in which the fish hypothesis is
not possible. My journey was on the
southeast coast, stopping at Madras,
Calcutta Darjeeling, and then across
the whole north of Hindustan, going as
far north as Lahore and passing down
to Mysore and Bombay. Leprosy is
scattered all over India: there is no
place which is absolutely free from it.
and it prevails to a very large extent
excepting in very few places. Tables
have been prepared which show that
five per 10000 is the average prevalence
of leprosy throughout the whole Indian
population There are no places in In
dia where the fish hypothesis is i'm
possible on account of there being 40
fish to eat. L will read you a brief
in India by Sir William Hunter. He
has written as follows: All the waters
of India, the sea, the rivers and the
tanks, swarm with a great variety OF
fishes, which are caught in every con-
ceivable way and furnish a consider
able proportion of the food of the poor
er classes. They are eaten fresh, or as
nearly fresh as may be, for the art OF
curing them is not generally practiced,
owing to the exigencies of the salt
monopoly Two districts. however,
were pointed out to me as being those
in which the fish hypothesis would not
apply on account of the great difficulty
of obtaining fish and the smallness of
it's supply.
1.-The Chota Nagpur district was one;
1t is an inland district situated rather
high up on hills in a sandy district, and
over and over again / was told IN Cal
cutta by men who were we'll experience
ed and had lived in that neighborhood
that if 1 would go to Chota Nagpur L
should find a district in which leprosy
prevailed and fish was not obtaInahie.
The other locality of which the same
thing was asserted was the sub
Himalayan country in the north OF
HinduStan. L was assured lnal the
people do not get fish there and yet they
have leprosy. The Chota Nagpur dis
trict is some distance from the sea and
has but few rivers. It's leper ASYLUM
is a little town. went there, of course.
and met the Rev. DR.. Harm, a medical
doctor as we'll as a theological one, and
said that my object in coming was to
question those of the lepers in the asy-
lum-more than 500 in number-who
said they had never eaten fish. DR..
Harm replied: I have not one in the
ASYLUM who has not eaten fish. They
have all eaten fish habitually.' DR..
Harms resident medical officer, who
was more familiar with the lepers
themselves than DR.. Harm himself, ad-
ded to this: Not eaten fish? Why,
great many of them think that fish has
caused it. Numbers have left off eating
fish in the belief that it had been the
cause of the Ieprosy and made 1t
worse So much for Chota Nagpur.
.'Why had my friends who said that
there was no fish been so certain?
They had Travelled through the district
RAPIDLY in the dry season, and they did
not realize that in the rainy season
every pool and river and brook was
ya Tlpntv