The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1912-09-23

DUTY TOWARD
PUBLIC HEALTH
President Welcomes Dele
gates to international Hy-
giene Congress.
UNITED STRTES HAS DRIVEN
DISEASE FROM THE TROPICS
Have not Only Made Regions Habit.
able for White Race, but Tropical
Races also have Been Developed
Through Sanitation Work.

Washington, Sept. 23.-Welcomed
by President Taft and attended by
some 5000 delegates from all parts
Of the world. the Fifteenth Interna-
tional Congress Of Hygiene and De-
biography convened today. 1t was
the first time in the sixty years of ito
existence that the congress has met
In the United States. United to FREQ
the human race of disease, these war;
riors for new and wider form of
freedom gathered for the exchange Of
greetings in Memorial Continental
nall, the marble home of the Daugh-
ters of the American Revolution. To
President Taft's. greeting, brief re-
delegation from each Of the thirty.
three countries represented. Discus.
stons and lectures will continue
throughout the week.
President Taft in the course of his
address said:
We need to develop under gov
department in which the funds Of the
government shall be expended. for
research of every kind useful in the
practice and enforcement of hygiene
and preventive medicine. That some
thing OF this sort may grow out OF
the present United States public
health service there is reason to be-
lieve. But it will need far greater
appropriations and a widening of it's
scope of duties before it shall have
tilled the place that the medical pro-
fessions of this country has the right
to expect the general government to
create In the progress Of hygiene and
demography.
Referring to the subject to tropical
hygiene the president said:
Our responsibilities in Cuba. Porto
Rico and the Philippines and now on
the lsthmus Of Panama have so en-.
iarged our knowledge of the posi-.
otlittes of successful santa ton under
the most burdcnsome conditions and
have impressed both professional men
and layman and all familiar with the
necessity for more rigid and compre-
hensive health laws. and stricter
enforcement Of them for the general
pubic good that If the Spanish war
resulted in nothing else it was worth
more than its cost in this useful de-
velopment OF one Of the most inn
portant functions that modern gov
making clear the need of an addi-
tional branch of general education
of the matter of the hygiene of the
home and the individual.
when we first went into the trop-
les our purpose was to make that
region habitahle for white people. We
have demonstrated that as a possi
bility. Now We have gone beyond
the mere provision for those who
come from the temperate zones and
We are engaged in developing the
tropical races into a strength of
body and a freedom from diseases
that they have never had before.
Il consider it a proud record OF
the American army that throueh its
medical corps engaged in hygienic
work in the tropics so many import
ant discoveries as to the transmission
of disease and the methods of stop
ping its spread have been given to
the world. and all this is dated chiefly
from the time of the Spanish war.
1T is very certain that but for
those discoveries the construction Of
the Panama canal would have been
impossible"
What the nation through the Uni.
ted States public health service and
its other bureaus is doing. and what
the states and cities and hundreds Of
private charities are doing in their
efforts to conserve the human
strength of the country is shown by
models Of all sorts.