Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-07-08
OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES
oUININE HAS CUT DOWN DEATH
RATE IN INDIA.
Exploration Of Africa impossible II
valuable In South America.


Quinine Is one of the most valuable OF all
the drugs known to medical science.
No one would venture to travel In India
without 1t. Before It's discovery 100000
people died annually in India Of malaria
fever. The mortality from this cause Ia
now less than half that number.
The poor people-so poor that they look
ed upon the fever as their fate and ex-
pected no relief-are saved by the agency
Of Quinine. England could not keep her
European soldiers in India without it.
Livingstone and other travellers in central
Africa could have never made their discov-
cries without its aid 1t Is said of the
great German explorer Schweinfurth that
when he lost his entire property by fire.
valuable scientific instruments among the
rest. he felt the loss of his Quinine to be
the greatest of all. and often thought with
fear OF the journey that lay before him,
which. however, he persevered in.
The soldiers in the American civil war de-
pended greatly upon quinine. The pioneers
in this country when it was first settled and
civilized had as hard work fighting fever
and ague in the then swampy. malarial dis
tricts as in fighting Indians. and quinine
was even more necessary than firearms.
Needed on Panama Canal.
The great interoceanic canal now in pro-
cess of construction across the Isthmus of
Panama requires the labor of thousands of
men largely unaccustomed to the climate
and so much more susceptible to Its Ill effect.
Before the route was decided upon many
surveys were made. and the men, naval Of
ficers and others. engaged In this work were
exposed to all conditions of weather. But
through the universal and proper use Of
the medicine daily as precautionary meas
ure the mortality was no greater than
among men in like employ in other locali-
a. C,.A q -rl.tkx
employed in the construction Of the Panama
railroad there were only 293 deaths. and
some Of these were the result of other than
climatic causes.
The whole world is Indebted to the chin
chona tree from which quinine Is made.
Who could have foretold that this tree, a
native of the mountainous forests of South
America, would be Of such Importance m
the advance of civilization and Christianity?
Its safe transportation from one side OF
the world to the other and the success at
tanned in converting wild into cultivated
plant and naturalizing it reads like a ro-
nance. One of the strange things about
qunine Is that it is not used as medicine
in the practice of the native physicians OF
Peru, Ecuador or Colombia.
Called by Many Names.
The native Indians did not even know of
Its curative property TIL enlightened by the
spaniards about go years ago. They called
the word quinine. What do you call 1t
kwine, kin-n;ne. keen-neen or kin-neen?
What lot of names the drug has had!
China bark, quna. quinGuina. chinchona
bark. quinine, cincona, countess powder
Jesuits bark. Cardinal de Lugo's powder
Peruvian bark, etc.
Great fortunes have been made out of 1t.
At the time when Louis XIV purchased the
secret a pound of the bark cost about $50
AS 1t came into general use it became a
most important article of export from Peru.
Now 1t Is successfully cultivated In Ceyion
and Java.
AS means of guarding the system from
intermittent fever the English naval reguia-
tions require that every man should take a
portion of the drug When the ship is within
certain distance of the east OF west coast
of Africa, and that 1t should be regularly
taken by those engaged in boat cruising
along the coasts or on the rivers creeks
We may say with as much truth now as
did Lambert in 1920: THE treasures which
Peru yields and which the Spaniards sought
and dug out of the bowels of the earth are
not to be compared for utility with the bark
of the qunquina tree. which they for
long time ignored