The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-05-05
TAFT DISCUSSES
 SOLDIERS HEALTH Shows Improvement in the Army Medical Corps EXAMPLE IS IN TEXAS President Says That For First Time in History Troops Have Been
 Mobilized Without Serious
 Disease Epidemics

Philadelphia, May 4.--President Taft was the guest of honor at a reception given here tonight by the Medical club of Philadelphia. The President was | hailed as the chief executive who had done the most for the advancement of medical science and his two recom-
 mendations that a national department
 of health be created by Congress was
 dwelt upon approvingly by Dr. w. L. iRo1irah, who presided
 President Taft referred In his ad- dress to the efficiency of the medical corps of the army and pointed out in l the camp at San Antonio where 1S,00O troops are quartered cnly one case of 1 typhoid fever has appeared. He com pared this to the dreadful scourge in Cuba during the Spanish American war where he said 90 per cent became in- l fected within eight weeks from the date l of mobilization.
 | The President said much money had been expended and many lives sacrificed In the Spanish American war, but they are nothing compared with the benefits to humanity which have accrued from the discoveries made during that period. Surgeon General George Torney of the army spoke on Sanitary Progress in the Fort and Field" and Surgeon General Charles F. Stokes of the navy
 
 sion of Mercy"
 The President praised the doctors of the United States army and doctors in general for the efficiency they have displayed in conquering disease In Cuba, In the Philippines and in the Panama
 canal zone He found justification for the war with Spain in the stamping out
 of yellow fever in Cuba that threat ened death to our southern cities" He reviewed the work of the army sur geons in combating yellow jack" in Cuba and Panama and In lowering the death rate from ch olera, bubonic plague beri-ber and other scourges in the Philippines.
 In concluding the President spoke of the lesson to be learned from the mobil- ization of troops in Texas and the fact
 that in the camp of 1S,000 men at San
 Antonio, only one case of typhoid fever had appeared in two months.
 And now said the President, we
 have a division of 1s,OOO men in Texas
 and California. They have been there for two months living under canvas and in a country soaked with rain and deep with profanity-provoklng mud But so effective have been the regulative and preventative methods adopted to reduce sickness that the percentage of sick men is less than 1t was in the posts from which those men were moblized. I need
 not recall the dreadful record of sick ness from typhoid fever in the camps at Chickamauga and other camps estab- lished during the Spanish-American war. "The percentage of typhoid cases was
 so high that it is hard to believe Of 10000 men there were 20,000 cases, with
 mortality of per cent. Of the voun- teer regiments mobilized during the Span- ish war 90 became infected with typhoid
 fever within eight weeks from the date
 of mobilization. Today, two months after mobilization, with the modern health reg ulations and by the use of vaccination against typhoid not one case of typhoid fever has appeared in the entire force except that of teamster who was not yaccinate ted.
 'It is hard to credit the accuracy of
 such a record. But. as I have it di-
 rectly from the war office. can assert it
 and give it as ono more instance of the
 marvellous efficacy of recent medical dis
 coveries and practice.
 When we consider how in times past
 the efficiency of an army haa been re-
 duced by large percentages through dis
 ease, we can realize what an important
 part of the army the medical corps has
 become. But without reference to war,
 when we consider the enormous ad-
 vances made in the discovery of meth
 ods of preventing disease in the tropics
 by members of the medical corps under
 government auspic ss. and all within the
 last 13 years. think we may take par donable pride In the record.
 we expended many lives and much money in the Spanish war and in the
 discharge of the responsibilities that have followed that war. But they are as.
 nothing compared with the benefits to
 the human race that have already ac- crued and will continue to accrue from the discoveries made under the conditions
 and necessities which the exigencies of that war and the governmental burdens
 followiny Il presented"
 On his way over from Washington the President talked reciprocity with Chair
 man Penrose of the Senate finance com
 mittee Senator Penrose told the Pres- dent that hearings would be held by his
 committee until May 13 in order that the constituents of the western senators might be heard. The bill. the senator thought. wouli pass the Senate without
 amendments.