Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-04-13
TYPHUS .SCOURCE
THREATENS EUROPE

One of the subjects which will be
studied at the Genoa economic con
ference beginning April 10 is the re
lationship of economic rehabilitation
of the scourge of typhus fever
which is officially reported from
Washington as threatening to SWEEP
across western Europe. 1t has been
epidemic in Poland, the Ukraine and
Russia for several years, and before
the war was one Of the diseases with
p which the people there were famil'
lar.
The problem at Genoa will be to
provide still more facile means for
the i1terfow Of trade between the
several countries, at the same time
preventing typhus fever from trav-
cling along with the swelling tide
of commerce The League of Red
Cross societies, the international
body formed by H. P. Dawson after
the war, has had experts in the field,
and showed officially that around a
million refugees rushed from Russia
into Poland in a single year, and
that practically every one of them
carried typhus-bearing body lice on
body or clothing.
Typhus is conveyed only by this
body louise. The extreme poverty Of
the refugees made it impossible for
them to procure clean clothing, and
ito sanitate their bodies and effects.
Furthermore, many Of. them said
with Slavic fatalism that God had
ordained it and that it was not only
useless but even wrong to attempt
to stamp it out.
After much work had been done
in Poland by outside organizations
and the Polish department of, pub
lie health towards stopping the in
flow Of typhus, and to cure that al
ready across the frontier, the Polish
organization lost much Of its eff
ficiency, largely because Of lack of
funds Then the intercourse be-
tween Poland, the Ukraine and Rus
sia began again, in spite Of lack OF
official treaty provisions, and. as
commerce openly or surreptitiously
flowed back and forth, typhus did
the same in increasing volume.
With the Russian famine added to
the situation is now said by the
Washington authorities to be most
alarming. The invasion of Western
Europe is feared, with serious re-
suits to the upbuilding of the eco
nonic processes.
It is with these threats to econom-
ic rehabilitation that the Genoa
conference will deal. Those who
have to do with the American relief
work in Russia and contiguous coun-
tries as rule ardently hope that the
United States will be REPRESENTED in
some manner at Genoa, if on no
other subject than the prevention
of an epidemic of typhus fever IN
western Europe. Its seriousness is
indicated by the figures that show
that deaths from typhus have aggre-
gated a hundred thousand in the
past three years, and of typhus as
an accompaniment of malnutrition
the total is several millions. Poland
lost 100000 in a single year and
had 100000 cases officially reported
by the census made by theN relief
organizations. ~
The economic loss from the typhus
scourge is threefold: The enormous
expense Of fighting it, the interior
ence with economic processes and
the loss of man-power. These three
factors combined would equal the
economic social voltage of small
nation, and their spreading across
Europe is feared by informed per-
sons as threat not at all incon-
sistent with the record Of the past
few years.