Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-01-12

Letters continue to come into this
column approving our mild structures
on fresh air in unwise quantities. The
latest to come to our desk asks, "If II
Is t:Cty a cure-all, why do we have more
sickness than ever before? Colds ton
Sils, flu, pneumonia and operations foI
one and all. Also, they say, all diseases
start with a cold and. I would like to
add as the result of impaired circula-
ton due to cold air from the open
windows day and night"
The flesh air "craze" vas one taken
over by the medical prof .ssion from the
untaught but Superen fhusiastic ath-
leticism which began II this country in
the early COS. Empires all, these first
fresh air fans found it benefited them
SO did not hesitate to Jump to the con-
clusion and to announce that fresh air
in unlimited quantities would help
every one.
So the United States had a vogue
for sleeping porches," and no home
was built for many years without its
porch devoted to the cult of fresh air
1t is significant, perhaps, that few
homes, except in rows are built with
them any more. While part of this
trend toward the abolition of the porch
in any form now that traffic has made
such sitting unpleasant in many neigh
borhoods, much of 1t is due to a de-
cline in the interest in fresh air as a
"cure-all."
The value of good, pure air no one
would question. The value of too much
cold air any one may bring into dispute
for himself. The success of an I'M
limited quantity of fresh air in the open
in the cure for consumption has led
to the usual enthusiastic acceptance
by the people of this country, prone to
overdo anything which they accept
Witness our "modernistic" Fourth of
July, which begins in most city neigh
borhoods now about June 4, and never
let's up until days afterward. Witness
the keeping of faded, brown Christmas
wreaths in windows weeks after they
should be removed.
Common sense seems to point to the
simple truth that about the time open
air began to be used as a therapeutic
means In the treatment of the great
white plague every other hygienic de-
vice began to be used with might and
main. In similar vein it is difficult for
those who advocate vaccination to prove
that this means alone is responsible
for the decline in q dread disease, be-
cause all other modern methods of
sanitation have been incorporated in
the attack upon it.
Every one who has kept his eyes and
ears open in regard to disease, espe-
cially the commoner sorts which come
to most Of us, knows that it is ex-
tremely difficult, if not impossible, to
pin down the cause to any one thing
or to separate one remedy from others,
and to say without qualification, This
has cured me-"
Hence the value of "fresh air" an
incomplete descriptive phrase, but one
which every one understands, more or
less, has never been proved at all. The
result Is that quiet common sense Of
the average American family Is quietly
dropping it from the shelf of remedial
gods where it once sat enthroned.
Let it be stated again that no one
disapproves of fresh air, properly un-
derstood and taken. We repeat again
that it Is an individual matter. II one
Is able to Withstand its pulling down
effects, he may be able to get it's
building-up effects. But cold air, like
cold water, has certain known effects on
the skin, and hence underlying organs,
and il good effects are desired, in a
sense, the proper reac-
tons must be secured The primary
effect of cold is contraction and a send
ing away Of the blood from the skin.
When the reaction comes the blood is
driven back into the skin. This is the
well known results Of properly taken
cold bath.
To secure this good effect from cold
air, however, the conditions must be
such that the reaction can be secured.
What the enthusiasts always overlooked
was that all human beings are not alike.