The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-08-27
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bv her sister cities in the Straits and
India, has cholera as well.
Coming now still a little nearer home
we have the plague-infected cities of
Kobe. Osaka and Yokohama while the
great circle is completed by Vladivostok
on the north which re1oices in its in
fiction with smallpox alone.
You all know the five quarantinable
diseases, smallpox, plague, cholera, vel
low fever and typhus. Of these the
latter is negligible. From what has
been already stated you can see that
all the other four, i. e., plague, cholera,
smallpox and yellow fever, are found
in the circle of cities that surrounds
Hawaii. Some of them in many of
these cities, and that some of these
cities are SO attractive that SIS many
as three out of the four dwell there
in amity at one time.
In addition to the five quarantinable
diseases there is also malaria, the in
Production of which, in view of what
has happened in Mauritius, would or
might be more disastrous even than
some of the big five.
You also know perfectly wei the
manner in which these diseases are
communicated, that plague is primarily
rat disease communicated to man by
the flea, that cholera is water and food
borne, that yellow fever and malaria
are transmitted by the Stegomyia Gallo
pus and Anopheles respectively. that the
yellow fever patient is infective only
during the first three days of his i'll
ness and harmless thereafter, that the
mosquito must then incubate her in
lection for eleven days before she can
pump the poison into some one else
after which she is infectious to the end
of her days. You also know that the
Stegomyia abounds here lit was first
discovered here and reported by me now
nearly seven years ago). In any sane
community with good sane medical
profession to preach and practise the
doctrine faith and works of vaccina-
ton smallpox can never gain a foot
hold. 1t is so easily handled, has been
so modified by successive generations
OF vaccination, and is so readily pre-
vented from spreading should it gain
entrance, that it has lost its terrors. and
need receive no further consideration
here. Moreover steamship companies to
protect their regular lines insist on
such rigid vaccination of crew and
steerage and as cabin passengers. as a
| rule, are so intelligent that they have
already been vaccinated, it is not like,
ly that the disease will be introduced.
In the case of cholera the period OF
incubation is so short, and when il
occurs on shipboard, the means of its
communication so readily destroyed
that L do not think the prospect OF
It's passing quarantine is alarming
Should it pass, however, the outlook
is not assuring owing to the custom
SO common here of eating fish. opihi
llmu, etc., raw. The one epidemic
here it is thought had its origin in
case that was carried to Mauliola
Island vomiting and discharging rice.
water stools as he went. The crab
bers and moss hunters of that dav
who swarmed daily over Mauliola reef
lived in the region of Kalihi and it is
significant that here the epidemic be
gan. / believe there were sixty-three
victims and it cost about $4,000 to
suppress the outbreak
But what about the other two
plague and yellow fever, with the
speed of steamships being constantly
increased, the number of vessels grow
ing annually greater and greater, and
The communications, pari passu, more
intimate! ana what, too, about ma
laria which is just as bad and more
insidious, for just as your local healtI,
officers can not isolate and quarantine
case of malaria SO also your quar-
antine officers can not quarantine and
disinfect incoming ships for malaria
or for what is still worse for malaria
infected mosquitoes. This particular
mosquito, | believe. does not exist
here, I was unable to find it. But
should he be introduced all the con-
ditions are satisfactory for his rapid
and continued increase and one case
of malaria if it be introduced can in
feet many mosquitoes. Cue day that
case would drop in, Ct have seen
three,) from the valley of the Sacra
mento. from the isthmus of Panama
or from some one of thousand other
places, and then trouble would be-
| gin.
In the case of yellow fever it seems
to me we are in still more precarious
condition, for here the fire is all laid
and ready, the kindling is evenly de
stributed, only the match is wanting
With large population entirely non
| immune, with the stegomyia widely
scattered all that is needed is one
early unsupported case of yellow fever
to slip through quarantine OF one vel
low fever infected stegomyia mos
quito to fit up Fort, street-after
which the deluge.
But the most difficult of all to keep
from getting into place and the most
difficult of all to get rid of, once 1t
has gotten in, is the plaque. Primarily,
| it is a disease of the rat, communicate
ed from him to man through the
agency of the flea and since men first
went down to the sea in ships the
| rat s love for the sea and voyage
! making tendencies have been known,
and their fecundity is as we'll estab-
lished as their fondness for travel. The
| record does not state that there were
more than pair on the ark at the
beginning of her voyage, but the
chances are better than even that her
skipper began that voyage with more
rats than his manifest showed, but
whether he did or not we can be sure
he had more at the end of voyage than
at the beginning. Whether or not
succeeding generations inherited from
+heiT forbpars on the ark this we'll