The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-07-14
THE PANAMA CANAL
By Fredric J. Haskin.
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HT-.-THE SANITATION

Aneon, Canal Zone, July i2--At this place is stationed the headduarters of the health army of the Panama Canal It is spending about $50 per head for the entire force each year to keep them well and to guard them against the most hideous foe of the canAl--epidem- icaI disease. This health army Is com posed of some 1000 trained men. and their implements of war are mainly mosquito and rat exterminators. In the Canal Zone they cut and burn or remove about 1e.000.000 square yards of brush q year. They drain a million square y4irds of swamps a year. cut 30.00o,o00 square yards of grass; dig a quarter million lineal feet of ditches, and clean 100000 feet of old ditches. They empty nearly million garbage cans a year, and over 100000 night soil cans. They fumigate about 100000 cubic feet of space in dwelling places in a years time.
 As If this were not enough they gath. CT nearly 11.ooo loads of sweepings and 25.oo0 loads of garbage in the city of Panama. sprinkle nearly 3.000.0o0 gallons of water on it's streets, and distribute three and half million gall Ions of water to the poor of the city. And then they have almost as much more to do at Cristobal and Colon. on the other side of the Isthmus. Be- sides all this they have to inspect 113.- 900 persons a year in connection with the quarantine, vaccinate some 10000 people arriving on the Isthmus, and some 15,ooo leaving. and issue some 34,000 circulars, of instructions with reference to maiariaf fever.
 With all this preventive work they combine the treatment of the sick on the Canal Zone. The hospitals have little to do now in comparison with oks aA 41,a "A. a.~.~ during last year was equivalent to treating 43s.0oo people for one day, at a total cost of s735.oo0.
 The mosquito Is responsible for most of the big outlay for sanitation. It was this little pest that outgeneraled the French and drove them ingiorious- ly from the task they had undertaken. Like the midnight murderer who steals upon his victim, administers the fatal blow and then disappears in the dark- ness as if the earth had swallowed him up, the mosquito managed to cover his tracks so well that he was never seri- ousiy suspected of being the criminal responsible for a million murders until he met his match in the American doc- tor. This latter gentleman laid the crime at the mosquitoes door and prov ed his case In Cuba. When Pa'aama was reached new hearing was grant, ed. Colonel Gorgas was the prosecut- ing attorney. Early Tn 1905 the trial began. The mosquito brought about so many cases of yellow fever that he was almost able to prove an alibi. He did so in the fninds of thousands. Tn fact he made out such a defense for himself that hundreds tore the screens from their windows. refused to sleep under mosquito bar, and professed entire in- difference to the mosquito. It even went so far that the Canal Commission itself was almost ready to line up on the side of the mosquito.
 At this juncture Governor Magoon ar- rived on the scene. He said he was afraid of the mosquito and that If Gorgas were given an opportunity to make his work absolutely thorough he would prove his case. And what is further. he said he proposed to afford that opportunity. Three months of ex. terminating warfare left so few yellow fever mosauitoes on the Tsthmus that Colonel GorGas offered $50 in gold to any one connected with the sanitary department who would report a ease of yellow fever. Thus was the u1os- quito sentenced to banishment from the Isthmus. and the sanitation brigade is carrying the sentence Into execution. Only comparatively few bushwhack. CTS remain and they are having a hard time.
 It takes about 15o,ooo gallons Of mosquito oil year to keep down these little blood-sucking pests who come after you, hammer and tongs There are fifty known breeds of mosquitoes on the Isthn1us and perhaps aome twenty more species which have not been identified. As perhaps one-third of the Canal Zone is swamps 1t will readily be seen that a good many gal Ions of oil must be poured on the mos quito troubled waters to keep the pests from multiplying. Of the fifty or more species of mosquitoes. ten, and prob- ably eleven, belong to the malaria producing family. Two of the others belong to the yellow fever producing class. What the other thirty odd species are engaged in hAsides annoying long suffering humanity has not been determined.
 It is the young mosquitoes that the Sanitary Department is able to axtar- mfnate. They live under the water. but have to come up to the surface with more or less frequency to get a breath Of fresh air. If one happens to come up where there is O drop of nosouIto oil his career Is suddenly terminated. as the oil goes down into his little lungs like so much lead, and he is soon oone Tor. As the average young mos- quito has to come up to the surface over eight thousand times during his larva life 1t will be seen that the odds are considerably against him.
 While the Sanitary Depa artrnent. tries 10 Keep track of every mosquito on the Isthmus, 1t is also keeping A weather eye out for the rats and mice. It is said that these rodents play the role of host to innumerabIe fleas. These fleas bite bubonic patient and then go off and bite a well person, travelling about on a rat or a mouse. So the battle of the health authorities Is to exterminate these flea carriers.