The herald-advance. (Milbank, S.D.) 1890-1922, 1904-07-22
BATTLES ALL SKILL
PLAGUE IN INDIA THE BANE OF
MEDICAL MEN.
All Efforts to Stamp Out Dread Dis
ease Have Been Futile-NatIves
Cannot Understand Necessity for
Remedial Measures.

The years come and the years
go, but the plague in India
SHOWS no signs of material abatement,
says the Boston Transcript. The
dreadful malady is becoming the de-
SPAR OF scientific Investigators. They
cannot stamp it out and they cannot
cou TOR its freakish manifesto
tons. The Pioneer Mail, published
in Allabahad, says they cannot say
why 1T takes hold upon one district
and passes by another why in one
year and place on epidemic will begin
n subside months earlier than in
another; least of all can anyone ven
ture to prcphesy when the country or
any part of it will be free of disease"
Nowhere, it is said, have preventive
measures met with less success than
IN the Punjab, though nowhere else
mas the government attacked the
problem with more energy and de-
termination. 1T must be admitted
that the people were not overwllling
to accept the good offices of the gov
eminent, but that is a condition of
things existing everywhere in India
and it constitutes the chief element in
the continual spread Of the plague
epidemics."
incubation has played an important
part in the fight against this disease
end with results that were very prom.
Using. Between May and September,
l9oO, nearly a quarter of a million PEG.
pie were i%noculated. The percentage
OF attacks among all such was 1872, as
compared with 1853 among ~uninocu.
lated persons, and the mortality in
cases Of the latter we're 52.15 pei
cent, as against $3.50 among the in.
oculated. Encouraged by these fig.
ures, in 19O2-1903 the Punjab govern.
ment undertook to inoculate 5000, 600
or people, practically the whole popu.
latiOn OF the thirteen districts most
seriously affected by previous cpl
denies. This necessitated a daily
supply OF 10000 doses of prophylactic
fluid. which the Bombay research lab.
oratory agreed to furnish. But in
stead OF this number of doses daily
1T was thirty-one days in supplying a
little over twice the amount, and then
1T was announced that the fluid would
be supplied by a different method
from the n previously followed.
On a certain day a number of per
sons were ~inoculated with the new
preparation and all of them developed
tetanus ard died. That wrecked the
whole scheme Instead of the 5000.
600, only about 400 900 had been inocu.
lated, ana the results of the tainted
serum had SO impaired the confidence
OF the natives that they could not be
persuaded to submit to incubation
with the pure mixture, and the gov,
eminent is now at its wits ends. The
authorities have practically acknowI
edged their helplessness by saying:
THE measure on which most re.
lance has been and must be placed is
evacuation
That is, the people must desert their
villages and remain away till the dis.
ease has died by lapse of time or been
killed by disinfection. But that would
seem to be rather a means of carrying
1T elsewhere, because all germs of ii
could hardly be left behind. A curl
u fact Of it's manifestation is that
in the large towns, where the people
are less amenable to preventive meas.
ures, there is comparative immunity,
though the plague has been many
times introduced among them. This
is one of the most serious of Eng.
lands present domestic problems, in.
cident to Ter f%ar-seeing battle line and
earth-girdling possessions. She has
here an evil to deal with that defies
her, the more so that the afflicted ma
tives do not take kindly to the means
employed for their relief.