The Birmingham age-herald., 1914-05-31
VALUE OF MINERAL WATERS
Doctor Thinks Water Itself, and Not
 Chemical Ingredients, Benefits

The intelligent individual eager to avail himself of the best aids that mod ern medical science affords cannot help being baffled by the conflicting claims made regarding mineral waters. He sees numerous cases in which re- lief has unquestionably been obtained
 by patients who have visited one of the many springs in this country or Europe: but when he considers the ossibilities--including rest, change of diet, and eIvironment-the result is a hopeless confusion of ridiculous claims.
 The added question arises of the rel ative value of the different uses of tho same waters.
 At some of the widely known spas for example, Saratoga-the internal use of waters takes precedence; at Mount Clemens White Sulphur Springs. and others, the baths are chiefly relied on; at Hot Springs and French Lick the combined methods prevail. In view of the diversity of practice and the impossibility of meas
 uring the consequences in any pre- else way, the Journal of the Amer ican Medical association agrees with Dr. Guy Hinsdale, secretary of the American Climatological association, in scouting the claims of the specific vir- tues of particular mineral ingredients
 in the waters, except in such obvious features as laxative action or the ab sorption of dissolved iron salts.
 If we assume" writes Dr. Hinsdale, that approximately equal results are achieved by course of bathing in waters so dissimlar, We cannot avoid the inference that the chemical con stitucnts of these different springs are, not as per SC the active therapeutic agents. That certain baths may be used with good results in a case of gout ought to suggest that the hydro therapeutic methods employed are more potent than the fact that the waters employed have a special chemical com position.
 "If the cultivation of the rational use of mineral waters involves an ac- curste knowledge of their contents, in- formation regarding them must have some guarantee of accuracy For the past 20 years 1t has not been possi- ble in France to advertise any mineral
 water as such, or to exploit mineral water station, without the favorable recommendation of d commission un- der whose direction the analyses are made If such rules were in force in the United States, fake 1ithia waters would long ago have been driven out of the market.
 "The damage to mineral springs re- sulting from uncontrolled commercial ventures is illustrated by conditions at Saratoga. The amount of mineral mat ter held in solution by some of the waters there obtained is dependent on the quantity of carbon dioxide which impre gnates the water and the pres sure exerted at the mineral water vein. For over 20 years an exhaustive pump ing of gas was carried on by car bonjc gas industry and a great deple- ton of the mineral water basin took place, depriving the entire area of ma terials which nature had furnished for tains. gt5
 reservation commission, has under taken protective policy with regard to the springs, and the pumping op- erations have been stopped, the resto- ration of the. mineral waters to the Saratoga basin Is being accomplished. Examinations by the state hygienic laboratory at Albany show the return of a steady flow and fairly constant mineralization, varying only With phy- sical disturbances. A few years must elapse before the springs will have re- turned to all the natural conditions which were present before the gas companies began their operations. These facts serve to show that scien- tific control may sometimes be a bene- fcicnt procedure, and that. presumably through the public health service, it ought to be applied more widely in the United 6tates.