The Adair County news., 1915-01-20
HEALTH OFFICERS COLUMN.
BY u. L. TAYLOR.

cause it is the most deauly disease Oh
all the known diseases. 1t is to be
found in all chimes and countries.
Hippocrates, who was perhaps the
most learned of all the Greek physi-
clans, wrote treatise on it 400 years
before Christ. Traces of consumption
have, we are told by writers been
found in Egyptian mummies, and then
several hundred years before Hippoc-
rates, 1 find consumption mentioned
in the Bible. In Leviticus rs and 16
verse, where Moses said to the rebel
lious people, l will appoint over you
terror, consumption, and the burning
ague that shall consume the eyes, and
cause sorrow of heart, and ye shall
sow your seed in vain for your enemies
shall eat it. In Deuteronomy % chap
ter and % verse, it is said the Lord
shall smite thee with a consumption,
and with fever, and with an infiamma-
tion, and with an extreme burning,
and with the sword, and with blasting
and with mildew: and they shall pur-
sue thee until thou perish. You no
tice that both times that Moses al
luded to consumption, he spoke OF it
as disease to be very much dreaded
About one-seventh of the population
of the United States die from con-
sumption, and the records show that
one third of the deaths between the
ages of Is and 55 die from its ravages.
1t is only quite recently that medical
men have learned the sources of infec-
tion and have attempted its treat
ment in purely scientific way. The
disease exists in every part OF the
globe, and has been studied under. all
conditions 1t is only since these re-
rearches have been made that people
have realized the enormous toll which
this one disease is eXacting every year
in human lives and in money. Is it
any wonder then, that persons who
know that this disease is preventable,
and see the awful burden which our
nation is forced to bear, should devote
their time and their money as we'll, in
the fight for its prevention? To con-
sumption can be attributed much of
the poverty and hardships of the peo-
pie, for the disease attacks In large
number of instances, persons who are
wage. earners. The family is thus de-
prived of its usual support, and in adj
dition has the burden of earning for
an invalid. In considering the causes
of consumption, physicians have been
handicapped by the idea so long prev.
alenU that consumption was an hered.
itary disease, and that all the mem.
bers of the family where one has died
from it, were doomed to destruction,
and that no earthly power could save
them. The people change their opin.
ions very slowly, ano it sometimes re.
quires thunder and lightning tt
change them. l know one instance
not many miles from here. A man
who had separated from his wife, AND
was living about ten miles away from
her, when telephones first came about
was denying that voices could be dis
tinguished on telephone. He sale
he knew that voices could be heard
but that they all sounded alike. The
man whom he was talking to asked
him where his wife was? He replied
down here about ten miles. Well sale
the man let me call her up, and yol
!, talk to her yourself, and see if vol
don't know her voice. He replied al
, right. The man got her to the phone
and the husband went up very feebly
took hold of the receiver, and said
"Hello Sally just at this TIM
there came in on the wire terrifi,
crash of thunder, and streaks of fork
ed tightening tore the box from tn
wall and knocked the old man down
q He rolled over on the floor a few
y times, then looked up and said
'That's Sal, know her voice"
D When 1 first begun fumigating TIL
houses where people had died from
consumption, 1 had that trouble t.
combat. The first house l went t
fumigate, there was very beautiful
girl of about Is summers, whose step
mother had just died from consumI
tion. She told me that fumigatin
= would do no good. That the diseas
was inherited. 1 did not know hoy
she expected to inherit it from step
mother. But 1 suppose she though
that tep-daughter could take an
thing from a step-mother. Notwitt
standing her objections, 1 finally COZ
& WINGED her that fumigation would d
the house no harm. 1 went ahea
and did the work, the young lady KEEP
on living, and is now married an
raising beautiful family.
I went to another place about !
miles from here, to fumigate hous
where an old man lived, whose so
=