The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1913-01-13

and surroundings clean as a proven
tive OF typhoid fever
1t was offered in debate by Hubert
r. kroh that while he believes in
sane sanitation, that government re-
ports show that 1t is bad when car
rted too far. Preventive treatment,
he quoted Pepper and government re-
ports to show, has been a signal fail
ure.
In the Spanish American war, with
good nursing at best to help them
through, all but seven per cent of the
American soldiers in the Cuban cam
paign recovered from typhoid fever.
This is in striking contrast to the re-
ports of the ultra sanitary camps Of
the British in the last Boer war. where
the typhoid mortality seems to have
gone up with the standards Of pre-
Ventive sanitation and the average was
II per cent
Pepper, and he is backed up by
many results Of observation at many
! points, says that in the case Of
smallpox epidemic, Is per cent Of the
Vaccinated, or those given preventive
treatment, contract the smallpox, while
| only 10 per cent among the unvacci-
| mated contract II.
Il might also tell you of the two
| physicians that were to be sent to
| investigate cerebro-spinal meningitis.
| They were given preventive serum
evolved, I think, by Simon Flexner.
Neither ever made the investigation
for they contracted the disease and
! died"
Give to Charity.
| Captain NJ. J. Bouterse said there
are so many apparent causes which
: narrow, in their final essence to sell
/ fishness, that he sometimes seems at
a loss TO get down to- tine bottom.
Il agree he said, that where san
itary surroundings are found there is
frequently found disease of the kinds
supposed to be prevented by SANTA
| ton.
ST also have found in Investigations
! of certain lumber camps whose owners
contribute to the charity organization
and other societies for human uplift
| that the workers and their families
are paid wages that hardly keep them
in the barest necessities and are forced
to live in little two-by -four shacks.
Bring it down to the core and I
| should say selfishness is the cause of
poverty
| W. 2. Cunningham, the chairman,
!
chief cause, as it makes the man or
the woman incapable of getting work
that will keep them comfortable or
limits their efficiency to do any Ger,
| tain kind of work.
Others dwelt more or less upon the
phase of social inequality. all of them
supporting the theory that selishness
and disease are the prime factors,
whether they are the same or not.
DR.. Borsts paper was, in part, as
follows:
THE chief causes of poverty from a
disease standpoint, in my opinion, are:
Consumption, malaria, typhoid fever
and the hooEworn disease.
In an extended discussion it would
be proper to consider the alcohol dis
ease, the tobacco disease, the private
diseases, the various forms of diar-
rhoea, dysentery and indigestion, pneu-
n1onia, the contagious diseases of
childhood, etc.
For practical purposes, however, 1t
4 is best to conf1ne this discussion to
consumption, malaria, typhoid fever
and hookworm.
Consumption has existed for untold
ages among practically all people and
in nearly every climate. 1t is taking
its toll in sickness and death steady,
year by year. When we remember
that one death in every seven, all over
the land is due to tuberculosis in all
forms, including consumption, and
that it is essentially a chronic dis
ease, the money cost is seen to De
terrible. The misery cost is incalcu-
liable, but the money cost can be es-
tin1ated.
I
die every year from tuberculosis in
the United States, or about $50 every
DAY, and that the average duration is
three years, it is readily seen that the
burden Of caring for the afflicted is
enormous.
Prof. Irving Fisher Of Yale Uni
versity, after an extended investiga-
ton, places the economic loss every
year in the United States at S1,100.-
900, 000
ut is estimated that on an average
every consumptive places upon three
or four other members of the COM
munity the burden of his prolonged ILL
ness and death.
Malaria as a cause of poverty has
not been studied extensively so far.
The chief recent effort in this direc-
ton was made by a committee OF
prominent physicians and health Of
ficers appointed by the Southern Medi-
cal Association at its regular meeting
in 1911.
This committee made It's report to
the Jacksonville meeting Of the society
in November, 1919, at which I was
present. ! am unable to quote the
exact figures published by this COM
mittee, but my recollection places the
direct money loss to the people Of the
south from malaria alone at between
one hundred million and two hundred
million dollars ANNUALLY.
"Of course we know regardless OF
statistics, that malaria is responsible
for anemia, debility and general help
lessness in a large class of our popu-
|