The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1910-08-04
THE SECOND DAY
Saving the Eyesight of In
fants Discussed by Health
Officers Yesterday
PUBLIC DUTY COMES FIRST

terday's Session OF the Health Or
ficers' School-Questions Involving
Pure Food, Water and Air Receiv-
ed Attention.
The 18th annual school for health
officers of the State which opened it's
session in Kellogg Hubbard Library
Monday evening convened yesterday
morning at $3.50 with discussion by
DR.. w. w. Styles of South Hero, and
E. M. Pike of Mendon on the paper
delivered the previous evening by H.
l.. Stillson of Bennington. DR..
Styles dwelt impressively on the i'm
portance of saving the eyesight of
new born infants and described the
one per cent solution of nitrate of
silver which is accessible to all peo-
pie. He urged its use not only among
poor and ignorant but among all
classes. He advocated antitoXin as a
preventive as well as curative measure
in case of diphtheria tendencies and
urged that the health officer sink his
private capacity of physician in his
duties to the public regardless of pri-
vate practice eve must NEEDLE
sometimes" he said, whether it
hurts our practice or not"
Mr.. Pike, by way of Introduction
said that the nearest he came to being
a doctor was when he was called in
the case of a sick COW which died but
that the great advance of sanitary
science in the last quarter century
was not to be ignored. He discussed
the pure food, pure water and pure
air problems and referred especially
and harmful to man. He urged the
elimination Cf the dust nuisance by
construction of other than sand roads,
oiling tho streets. etc. Zone auto
mobile" ne said, creates more dust
trivance of chimneys and resetting of
boilers, a method entirely within the
reach of all.
Mr. Stillson closed the discussion
on his paper with the information
that twenty-five and one half per cent
of fuel might be saved by new con-
than a caravan of wagons"
Prof. kOber's Paper.
Probably the most important source
of information on vital matter was
the address of Prof. George M. Kober,
of Georgetown University, Washing
ton, D. c., whose subject was Dis
eases that Menace Public Health and
Morals" Prof. Kober, whose paper
appears later as a portion of a report
of investigating committees upon
which he is serving, said in part:
"At the meeting of the American
Public Health Association in 1909 a
committee was appointed to consider
and report upon the best methods of
educating the public with res pect to
the communcability and prevention
of gonorrhoea and syphilis. The So
Geological and economic Importance
of these diseases have long been ap-
preciated by the medical profes sion
and intelligent laymen, especially those
who have witnessed the sad effects
germ laden and injurious to crops
to the smoke nuisance, the dust rails
ed by automobiles on sandy, highways.
among the inmates of hospitals, pris-
ons, almshouses, asylums for the in
sane, the blind, etc. In 1858, DR.. w.
w. Sanger, the resident physician of
Blackwell's Island, prefaced a report
in part as follows:
Hitherto reticence has been the
policy. This position has been held
too long for it is false in principle
and injurious in tendency. The day
has arrived when the shroud must be
removal, when those who regard II
as a small wrong may have their at
tsntion directed to the real proper
tions. A small matter it is not.
Nor is it unmanageable except when
concealed. Stripped of secrecy, there
appears vice arising from an ineXtin'
guishable natural impulse on the par
of one sex, fostered by coniidine
h weakness in the other, from socia
= disabilities on one side and social op
preston on the other; from the vile!
of the deceiver working upon unsus
pecting credulity and from the sterr
necessity to live Another physician
says, In our puritanical prudence W.
have been taught not to talk of Ger
very fundamentals of society Whei
we try to study such diseases, W.
have been rebuked as morbidly Gu
rious and those who call attention Il
the evil have been discredited as fad
dists looking for notoriety.'
"And still another physician: 'Reti
cence on these subjects is justified
only so far as it makes for youthful
innocence. But ignorance is not in
nocence; on the contrary, it is tn
surest road to guilt
Statistics of Yenereai Diseases.
"The absence of accurate statistic
in venereal diseases in civil life is t.
be deplored. Our present mortalit
statistics are also woefully defectiv
simply because the attending physician
prefers to spare the feelings of tn
friends of the deceased by ignoring
the primary cause Of death. Compul
sorry notification is exacted in Den
mark, privacy being safeguarded by
number.
eve all agree in our combat wit
communicable diseases, it Is necessar
to locate the sources of Infection, an
that we can never hope to stamp ou
the germ diseases unless we stop tn
dissemination of the germs. How
ever encouraging our efforts to di