The wageworker., 1910-01-22
PREVENT TUBERCULOSIS

with this disease were to die or re-
immunity from the scourge could be
achieved in much less than ten years,
but every one will not SO contribute
to the welfare of his fellow men and
posterity, of course. We have the
ever travelling consumptive who dies
in our railroad station after injecting
his surroundings en- route; and we
have the unteachable consumptive who
wilfully neglects all the laws of man
and nature; he is doomed, desperate
and recks not of the disaster his un-
cleanly habits spread wherever he
goes. For him laws must be enacted,
for in his way he is as great Grim
inal as the thief in the night who
steals our treasure; as great a menace
as the leper at large and infinitely
more numerous. For the travelling
consumptive who passes through our
gates spreading his trouble as he
passes. or who dies without funds on
our dOorsteps, laws are now enacting,
exclusion rules are already passed.
The philanthropic resources of states
like Colorado. New Mexico, Arizona,
Texas and California, have been taxed
to their utmost to provide for con-
sumptives sent west at their last gasp
and on their last dollar by unscrupu-
lous and ignorant physicians willing
to shift the heavy responsibility to
other shoulders. If the disease be in
the durable stage, it can be cured at
home; if it cannot be cured, then
home is the best place to die. Rhode
Island, with it's lamentable climate.
has proved to us what can be done in
ouro uyo11 ,,rovpntivo work Itc
outdoor schools for tuberculosis chill
dren are achieving results beyond ex-
pectations, and this in climate of
fog and mist, raw winds and little
sunshine. New York, which undoubt-
edly has greater problem than any
other city, reports a lessening of it's
death rate from this cause in the last
year. New York is the richer for
this not only in lives but in cold hard
dollars. New York has been con-
vinced that the economic aspect of the
problem is of prime Importance; it
knows that the deaths from tubercu-
losis of wage earning male averages
loss of $4,000 to his community. and
that last year it lost sivty-five millions
in dollars to this arch despOiler. Ne
braska does not know what it lost last
year. accurately. at least: it's vital sta
IlSllCS are uOC lOT one Ted-
son and another. 1t knows in a gen.
eral way that the death rate from
tuberculosis is increas sing each year;
it knows that its monetary losses
therefrom run up into the hundreds
of thousands. but how soon will it be-
lieve that all this is unnecessary. that
the life you hold dear, the property
you worked for may be saved or lost
to you according as you take precau-
tion. One out of nine people dies
from consumption. and by the nature
of his lingering disease, unless wealth
is at hand, he dissipates his savings.
if he has any-infects his surround
ings. mayhap his dear ones and final
/ ly goes down to his grave failure. A
failure because he did not live his life
as nature intended him to. We are
one the edge of scientific inquiry only
we have but the dimmest insight into
what our grandchildren will under
stand fully as a matter of course A
hundred years from now the world
will laugh because in this day of ours
lived some who looked for relief to a
religion patented in a church or a
medicine patented in bottle.
We know now that one in three had
smallpox in Queen Elizabeth's time,
and we naturally say, something &
wrong in their methods. Isn't there
something wrong in our methods when
one city can lose sixty-five million of