Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1921-03-29
Two Amazing Diseases Have Visited
New York.
HlCCUPS BATTLING ALL TIE DOCTORS
Sleeping Sickness Causes Many Deaths
Physicians. Have Found No Cure
Two Affections Said to be Con-

two new and altogether amazing epi-
denies this year. One of them is
sleeping sickness; and the other Is
that common and heretofore insight
ficant malady known as hiccups. At
least, so they are called, but neither
is running true to type.
For the sleeping sickness. which is
now so prevalent in New York, is not
the same as the famous sleeping sick
ness of Africa, the cause of which is
we'll understood. Nor is the present
epidemic Of hiccups in any way relat-
ed to those gentle attacks, occasionally
experienced by every one, more espec-
tally since the pocket flask has be-
come SO popular. The new hiccups
are singularly malignant and persis-
tent, and are not at all humorous.
They attack their victim every few
seconds during the day, and are not
always to be suppressed by deep
breaths, drinks of water, chunks of
bread and other well-known devices
Sometimes hiccup spasrn lasts for
over an hour, and the hiccup series ex-
tends for weeks at stretch.
Both epidemics, affecting hundreds
Of persons, have completely bafied
New York medical men. and all other
medical men, for that matter. No one
has been able to discover how or
whence they came; what to do for
them while here, or to get rid of them.
oratories of the city, such as that Of
the Rockefeller Foundation, have come
various theories as to their cause, none
of which has proved convincing.
The most interesting one recently
advanced is that the two Affections
are in some mysterious and subtle
way connected that prolonged hic-
cups are merely one of the many ir-
ritating symptoms of sleeping sick
ness yet this is by no means unani-
mously accepted.
The only fact accepted without chal-
lenge concerning encephalitis .lethar-
gina, which Is s. SIS impressive scien-
tific name, Is that it does not spring
from the same cause as the African
malady of the same name. The lat
ter Is known to be produced BY the
bite Of the tsetse fly, whose chief diet
is the blood Of the crocodile. I'm
drinking the crocodile's blood, accord
ing to an official of the New York
health department, the tsetse fly i'm
bibes the lazy bug lurking therein. The
lazy bug doesn't do the crocodile any
harm, and it doesn't do the tsetse fly
any harm, but when the said unpro-
nounceable fly injects the lazy bug
into horses and cattle it kills them off
by the thousands, and it does the
same thing to humans, especially the
black ones. In three years. its deadly
bite killed 100000 natives in one Afri-
can province"
A New Disease.
But the sleeping sickness which is not
more than two years old, must be
something entirely different, because
we have no tsetse flies in this part Of
the world, and the only crocodiles
about New York are kept behind a
glass window in the zoo. Still, E. Le-
thargina must have cause, and the
medical profession Is striving gallant
ly to supply It, Some of it's members
believe that it is merely an after-ef-
feet OF influenza, but this does not
help much, because the influenza germ
remains to be identified. Besides this,
many others among the profession are
equally certain that Influenza has moth
ing to do with the affliction.
"It is a fact that many of our
sleeping sickness patients have had
Influenza" declares DR.. Josephine B.
Neal, of the research department of
the Willard Park hospital here, "but
we must remember that a large part
of the population Of this city has been
afflicted by the last epidemic of near
ly three years duration. So you see
that it is only to be expected that
aiming SlSepillS oiShitSoS PatiS'eo tiSAS
will be a certain percentage who have
had influenza"
Another theory which attracted
much attention for brief period was to
the effect that the disease was the
same as infantile paralysis. The
symptoms, it was pointed out, were
greatly alike. in spite Of the fact that
they were like the symptoms of ty-
phoid fever Just as the beWildered
laymen laid aside one statement In the
pleasant belief that the mystery had
been solved, along came another from
some other authority, asserting that
sleeping sickness was not the slight
est bit similar to infantile paralysis; :;
that one was a disease Of. the brain, and
the other disease of the spine.
Never have doctors disagreed more
widely. Not only do they disagree as
to the cause of the sleeping sickness,
but they disagree as to its symptoms.
At first, it seemed to be generally ac-
cepted that the symptoms were:
Dropping eyelids. stupor, unconscious
ness of surroundings. headache and
in extreme cases, coma, delirium and
vomiting. A few instances coming be-