The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946, 1927-10-07

eye on me, but betraying weakness
dence. He was an authority in his
own office; he sized up a situation
and he acted. Here he was a trife
some bad things of virus. His chill
dren weren't sick yet and he didn't
see the sense of doing things to them
that might be harmful. / could read
all these ideas in the set of his jaw
even before he answered me.
1--WE heard something of that, "
he said Its all right, | suppose, if
you get good virus. III see how they
are tonight"
| might have been missionary,
Judged by the zeal of determination
that seized me. A blue-devil bat
ta.ion of facts flashed through my
mind | hurled them at him. It's
true | talked quietly, but | gave him
something of what a lifetime OF
work with infectious diseases and
serums had taught me. | poured
figures out before him. He'd under
stand figures.
"Do you know" | asked him, "that
in 1924 right here in New York state,
outside of New York city, there were
1886 cases of diphtheria Do you
know that 368 of the victims died?
And let me tell you this, more than
half of, them were under five years of
age You have two little girls. Do
those facts mean anything to you?"
He wasn't very comfortable. In
fact, he wasn't even trying to hide his
fright.
you're telling me that young
children get it and die more often
than any other people?"
Emphatically | was. | jabbed an
other fact home: Until recently one
out of every ten cases of diphtherla
has ended fatally.
He fiinched.
was beginning to be sorry for
him, but still had story to tell
| would gladly have stood up on
seat and soap-boxed the whole car
for there were lot of men in it,
conscientious good fathers, who
needed to know the truth and the
whole truth Recently" | said,
"since Behring in Germany and Roux
over in France discovered antltoXln,
we've learned how to protect your
children, every child from diphtherla.
We have such things as Schick tests
which will tell us whether child is
immune or isn't. We have toxin anti
toxin to immunize him if he isn't.
And if he should contract diphtherla
through the ignorance or carelessness
of those responsible for him, we have
antitoxin to check the disease and
save his life. Don't fool yourself
about good and bad virus. There's
only good; every bit of it has to pass
federal inspection. If a child gets
diphtheria nowadays, it's his parents
| fault.
Hold up, Doctor, Pm not trying
to murder my own children. They'll
get their squirt of virus all right"
The train was nearing the station and
my companion was already out of his
seat. He was heading for a tele-
phone booth as fast as his two feet
could carry him.
"Thanks," he called back to me,
thanks"
| hurled last shot at him. pass
the word along to your neighbors.
They have children, too" He waved
me hand of assent and | caught the
words: 81 sure will"
Imagine, / thought to myself, if
every individual father in the United
States pulled himself together and
! investigated these things. Imagine
how quickly diphtheria and smallpox
and typhoid would cease to exist.
There is plan afoot today to in
form the individual fathers, to put
the facts to them so clearly that there
won't be such a thing as not knowing.
This magnificent plan, which en-
braces not only our own progressive
states but the whole of North Amer
ica, had it's beginning in the spring
of 1926, at the Conference of the
State and Provincial Health Author
tiles of North America. The Presi-
dent of the conference who is also
deputy minister of health at Sas-
katchewan, Canada, DR.. M. M. Sey
mour proposed it; and the conference
adopted it, under the weighty name
of the Seymour Plan for Disease Pre-
vention. The wheels began to get in
motion last September and they will