The Lakeland evening telegram. (Lakeland, Fla.) 1911-1922, 1917-04-26
What is good health worth?

tive organization in constant touch
with the advance of medical science,
Is watching for every sign of ap-
preaching disease ready to ward it off
and stop it before it reaches Florida's !
shore OF border?
Is 1t worth the expense to he able
10 go about your business undis-
turbed by the anxieties that used to
.oeset Floridans twenty years ago
from the fear that an epidemic of
hideous disease might sweep the state
any summer, knowing that these
things are being watched for you by
men who are always ION the job?"
is it worth dime a year to be
protected by ample warning and by
iree vaccine from smallpox? Is it
worth the price to be able to procure
at a large discount from ordinary cost
antityphoid serum, antimalaria serum
and all the antitoxins that have been
discovered and proved efliicacious, or
have them handed to you free of cost
if you haven't the price?
Everything that can possibly be
measured in dollars and cents, and
some things that can't are valued by
that standard. Even human life has
its cash value in the courts. but that
value is not its worth to the posses.
sor, merely an estimate Of its worth
to his relatives after the owner has
parted with it, For years the dime
has approximately been the cost to
every citizen of Florida of the admin
istration of the State Board OF Health
and this cost is diminishing rather
than increasing as the population
grows and the available health fund
remains almost stationary. The vari-
alton from the dime has been in frac.
tons Of one cent.
II is a fact hat the taxpayers have
contributed more than the per capita
dime, but the dime Is what has been
spent for the legitimate purpose OF
health protection, for which the board
was created; and the Board has been
perfectly honest al 1.-The way through
merely obeyed orders. The differenC
between the tax collections in the
state for health purposes. and the to
tails actually spent for such purposes
and it amounts from quarter to
a third Of the collections-is paid for
hog cholera serum and it's distribu
ton free of cost to the farmers OF
the state. The expense has run as
high as 100000 in some years fol-
the medicine is ten times as costly as
14-year old whiskey bottled in bond
under the seal of the United States
Government.
health fund for glandered animals
which have been killed when the dis
ease is discovered and the owners
are recompensed to the extent OF moi
.. more than $500 for each ANNA
killed for this reason. And there are
other and smaller expenses that have
to be paid from the health fund, and
il is all paid by direction of state
legislature that met some years ago
and this imposition on the people o.
Florida and on the Health Board has
been continued by the silence or fail
ure of subsequent legislatures I,
| amend the order
| or course. these expenses may b.
| legitimate charges on the taxpayers
| but they have no more to do will
| the conservation of human health IL
| Florida than serum-cured hog haI
| to do with a moving picture matinee
While the average taxpayer has beef
firm in the belief that all his half-mil
: tax for heath purposes has been go
ing for the protection of his hom'
and wife and children, he has reali.
J been paying for other mems dea'
/ horses and medicine for other mem
sick hogs.
| Compared with the per capiti
charges in some other states 70
health conservation. Florida's dime i
large. The fact confirms thee lain
and the compliment that Floridi
places higher value on publi
health than some other states. Prob
ably Florida heads the list OF the A
states in its standards and method
for the education of its people. II 8
among the first in its distribution o
preventive medicines to the popula
ton OF the state. and more than this
from its geographical situation Flor
ida is the natural gateway for tn
entrance of contagious diseases from
the pest-laden states OF the Garth
bean and the West Indies. Thu
Board OF Health has been for three