Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1911-08-11

down to death, is
no respector of rank or wealth. Cough
ed, sneezed, spat and breathed into the
air in incOnceivable billions n dmyrtads
of billions, and swept by the winds in
to every home in the land, or intro
duced into the bodies of men and wom-
en- by more subtle ways and contacts,
the disease germ has at its mercy
every one Of us who is not naturally
immune to its activities. Public san1-
tatiOn, however strict, can do nothing
t. prevent the spread of tuberculosis
or pneumonia, diphtheria or scarlet
fever, Influenza or t~etanus, to say moth
liz of numerous other fell malignan-
cic, the causes of which are at present
unknown.
IN attempt to stamp out or even to
I,,iuce the ravages of the great
White plague" by public sanitation are
q, aOpelessly feeble, and quite as vain,
n the loud beating of tom-toms by a
horde Of African savages to brighten
away an eclipse Of the sun. Our con-
crosses for the prevention Of tubercu-
losis are about as helpful as would be
a congress called for the purpose OF
securing good weather for crops.
Time, money and much talk would be
saved by not holding them at all. No
body knows the truth Of this assertion
better than the men who are doing the
really scientific work in this line-the
a~ristOcrats of laboratory research. OF
the delegates to a tuberculosis con-
gress very few know anything worthy
of mention about the scientific part of
the subject, and these competent few
nave only a Ianguid interest in popular
anti-spit crusades, fresh air cures and
other helpless devices of that kind.
They are deeply interested, however,
In the experimental work going for
ward in certain laboratories Of Eu-
rope.
1t is amusing to see the health de-
partments of our large cities urging
the citizen not to spit or the sidewalk,
when that same citizen (and perhaps
the health officer himself) coughs,
sneezes, snOrts and talks germs by the
billion right into the c~ircumambient
air or into the faces Of his fellow citi-
zens. And THIS same citizen straight
way expectOraIes ad hbitum in the
roadway, there to minGle his particular
germs with tetanus and other organ
isms that foregather by the myriad in
the dirt-dirt In which the bacteriOlO-
gist can find most any old germ" he
has a mind for.
These methods of prevention are fu.
tile on their face. Why refrain from
splitting on the sidewalk, or anywhere
else, when we carry into our homes in
the dirt on the sOles of our boots
enough bacteria to people a newly ere
ated planet? 1t reminds one of the
soldiers who, when ordered to storm g
fertilization, were afraid that the bull
let's of the garrison would hit their fin
gers as they were climbing over the
walls. Even the physician who gets
only a slight glimpse while at schoO
of that incomprehensible thing, the
animal body, should know that the
most powerful disinfection Is at bes'
but a makeshift.
Thus far in the history of the human
race nature itself has been the bes
immuniZer of men to disease. A maj
is naturally immune to a disease whe1
his body naturally manufactures a sub
stance the presence of which in tn
body neutralizes the poisons produced
by the multiplication Of bacteria in tn,
body.
FOg ages in the past man has beel
~surmounting disease after disease
climbing up the mountain on the sun
NIT of which Theoretically he shal
be Immune to fatal disease of ever
kind. Countless billions of human
lives have been the price paid for thi
progress; countless billions, who, no
naturally immune to these diseases
have been swept away before the ag
at which they could reproduce thei
susceptibilities in their children. Onl
those who were naturally immune hav
survived, and these have passed dow
their immunity to their offspring.
measles, hat classic disease of child
hood, We nave one Of those ancier
maladies not yet conquered by maj
and for the simple reason that it
seldom fatal. We're measles invariabl
mortal, it had been wiped out 'onI
long ago.
When nature wipes out a diseas
from among men she does 1t in n {
two ways: eithe- by destroyin
through the disease itself all non-in
mune individuals while children-thu
safeguarding p~osterity; or by permi
nently minimizing non-immune ind
viduals by slow incubation. 1t is b