The Palatka news and advertiser. [volume] (Palatka, Fla.) 1908-19??, 1916-01-28
FlOrida's Health Conditions.

FLORIDA HedlIn COnQltlOnS.
No state or section in the Unior
has better conditions, natural or ar.
tificial, favoring health, low sick anC
death rates and longevity than Flori
da.
No place on earth is ideal, and no;
even the most ardent lovers of this
great southern peninsula will admit
that it has no drawbacks-for per-
lection is not really to be expected
this side the Pearly Gates, but in
Florida the expectancy of good, heal
thy working efficiency is at least
equal to the expectancy of bright,
sunshiny days and invigorating
breathable air.
A big asset of Florida is climate,
so much advertised that jealous neigh
bors have seriously declared that it is
really her only resource. But it is
condition of clean air, saturated
with the salt of the surrounding
oceans, with a temperature that en-
courages out-of-door living all The
year round. 1t gives an advantage of
untold, unreliable value over the Sec
lions where lower temperatures de
mand an indoor existence through
many months of the year. Vigorous
men and women love outdoors and
that is exactly why Florida is
thronged today and in this particular
winter season with greater numbers
of northern visitors probably than
ever before in her history
But climate is not the only re-
source favoring health. 1t is easy,
very easy, to forfeit this advantage
by neglect of the laws that govern
the transmission of disease, and ig-
norance of these laws does not avert
the results of their fracture.
Within the last few years, two or
three, this state has walked up to the
commercial advantages of good roads
and within the fifty odd counties she
is spending almost six million dollars
in their construction.
More than twenty-five years ago
she walked up to the commercial ad-
vantages of good health, and under
the authority of the Legislature of
1889 and of subsequent gatherings OF
the solons at Tallahassee, she has
been spending half mill tax on all
the assessible property in the state,
to secure and to preserve it.
1t is fact that no state is better
equipped today, as a reuslt of this
wise decision back in the SOS to COM
bat disease directly and through the
education of the people to knowledge
how to obtain this advantage for them
selves by better sanitation and better
living. 1t is quite within the re.
membrance of young men that the an
nouncement of yellow fever in any
Florida city brought a shudder
through all the state, and it's nearer
approach to any given locality crowd
ed the trains with refugees to the
North. Now, such an alarm would
be answered with reference to the
State Board of Health. But such
alarms don't come any more, for this
disease and others have banished and
their coming made as impossible as
human knowledge and foresight can
make anything impossible.
Experts alert and in closest touch |
with the constant advances of medi-
cal sciences, are in charge of health
situation. They are backed by the
authority of the state, with supreme
in emergencies, they are
equipped with laboratories in widely
parts of the state for the
sturdy of disease in the individual and
in epidemic-it is a condition of pre-
paredness that has for years prevent
ed the necessity of war.
The education of the people of
Florida to a better knowledge of their
physical selves of the laws of health
and sanitation, has been one of the
weapons in the fight against
disease invasion and epidemic and
he most recent addition to this educa-
tional equipment is the Health Train,
now on its initial journey through the
state. The three remodeled Pullmans, |
with their panels and models and
and literature In
'harge of thoroughly competent rep
of the Board of Health
ave been thronged with people earn
astly eager to learn. These people
ave returned to learn more, they
ave brought the school children, and
heir live interest shows the educa-
ional value of this travelling school.
If it be really a fact that in knowi-
EDGE is power, the people of Florida
rave within their reach the facilities
or becoming more and more efficient
n their care of themselves and for
making the state a model for the ma
ion and the world in practical sani-
alton and health-State Board of
Health Bulletin.