The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1920-05-06
BAMBERC FIGHTS
MALARIA MENACE
TOWN TO DANISH FEVER CAR
RYING MOSQUITO.
Leads Way in South.
With Experts on Job, Control Project
Goes l7orWard.-WOrk of Eco
nOmic Value.

The following was published in the
Columbia State Monday:
''Bamberg stands unique among
southern towns in that it admitted the
presence of malaria in it's environs
and welcomed the assistance of the
agencies that freed the Canal Zone
from that menace to health in putting
on a campaign to entirely eradicate
the anopheles mosquito. AS result
the state board of health and the
United States public health service
have under way here a malaria con-
troll project which will shortly be
completed with the Punishment of
the fever carrying mosquito, while
other towns still resist the imputation
that some of their people are subject
ed to danger from this source.
E'Dr. Carter, whose work in Panama
made him famous, found family on
the outskirts of Bamberg whose actual
losses in expenses of illness and idle
time in a single year totalled $3.50,
not counting suffering and other fact
ors. There were others in the low
grounds almost as bad off and the
people of the town decided that they
could not afford such menace. DR..
Carter told them that in his expert
ence he had found malaria to do
more damage to the whole population
where it exists than any of the great
epidemic diseases that the layman
looks on with such horror-yellow
fever, bubonic plague, etc. By public
subscription the people raised a fund
of $4,000, practically s5 per capita
which was duplicated from other
sources by the cooperating organlza-
tions and the work put under way.
ga typographical survey of the
town and adjacent territory was made
and every pool, pond and swamp de-
fined and marked for drainage. Thir-
ty miles of bitches will be required
and the work is already well advanc-
ed. The United States public health
service, which supervises the work,
learned much during the war about
making camp sites mosquito free by
drainage and these lessons are being
put into practice for the benefit of
the civil population. The most diff
cult. ditching problem in the South is
opening up cypress and gum swamps
where water stands most of the time
and where cutting right of way
costs almost as much as ditch in the
open. The Bamberg project includes
five miles of ditch through such con-
ditions and this part of the work is
being done with explosives. A blast
ed ditch clears it's own right of way
as the waterway is opened. A fore
man and three laborers at Bamberg
have opened 1900 feet of ditch
through swampy land, waterway
six feet wide and four feet deep
through roots, stumps and trees, in
single day at less cost per cubic foot
than open ditching is being done by
hand in fields nearby. Progress is
not always so rapid, but the blasting
is so much faster than hand work
that the dug bitches look like they
hold back the work to it's disadvant-
age.
:'Bamberg leads the procession in
malaria control. Valdosta, Ca, has
done considerable work of the same
character, but did not make survey
of the situation and set out to do a
complete job of drainage. Triton and
Moultrie, Ca, are beginning the work
and Chester has project under way.
Already in Bamberg swamps have
have been unwatered that always held
water before and much good land is
being dried out for cultivation, al
though this is not 1and reclamation
project but insurance of public health.
The work is under the supervision OF
Capt. L. NJ. Fisher, United States
public health service, and is proceed
ing with remarkable speed despite
difficulties in labor supply for the dug
ditches"
Cairo. April 2S.-The work Of a |