Henderson daily dispatch., 1938-01-17
WAR ON SYPHILIS
TAKING ON SPEED
State Health Board Plans
Utmost Benefit From
Reynolds Trust Fund
Daily Dispatch Bureau.
In the Sir Walter Hotel.

Raleigh, jan 17.-Dr. Carl V. ReY-
nolds is playing a lead role in an an
cient drama involving tragedy, suf
fering and death.
Other actors in the drama have
been Christopher Columbus, Sir Wal
ter Raleigh and Zachary Smith Rey-
nolds. The theme is syphilis and the
State health officer is the only living
principal character in this particular
cast He is holding out the hope of
life and happiness to millions of SUI
pernumeraries Of these, 100000 are
in North Carolina.
DR.. Reynolds, armed with the in
come from $7Oe0,C90 fund set up
by the Smith Reynolds heirs, will
wage relentless war on syphilis in this
State. Incidentally the health officer
is not related to the tobacco Reynolds
from whom came the fund.
1.-THE 100000 we have already re-
ceived from the Reynolds Foundation
for our campaign against syphilis in
North Carolina will only enable us to
scratch the surface the first few
wears. however, DR.. Reynolds said.
I'm fact. we estimate we will need the
proceeds from this $7,000000 fund for
at least Is years in order to make
any great Roadway in graduating
syphilis in the State.
But we have the satisfaction of
knowing that we now have more
money to spend in this work than any
other southeastern state, probably
more than any other state except
New York
North Carolina already has 81
syphilis and venereal disease clinics
in operation as the result of the S25,-
600 appropriation made by the last
General Assembly for this purpose.
The 100000 just received from the
REYNOLDS Foundation will Zee used to
expand only about II of these, how
ever, located in the more populous
counties where the need is greatest,
DR.. Reynolds said. The counties must
augment this money to some extent
from county funds.
The medicines used in the treat
ment of syphilis will not only be sup
piled free Of charge by the Board OF
Health for all clinics, but will also be
supplied without charge to all ply
~
with the board in its anti-syphilitic
program.
All average of about 70 weeks is US
ually required to cure a case of cur
able syphilis, DR.. Reynolds said. The
accepted treatment now is one inno-
culation a week for so weeks of an
arsenic preparation administered in
travenously, followed by one shot a
week for 40 weeks of a bismuth pre-
paration, injected into the muscles.
Columbus is in the syphilis drama
because it is generally agreed ~ medi-
cal historians that syphilis first de-
veloped in Haiti, where the sailors of
the great Genoan landed in 1892. BY
them it was carried round the world
to become one of the most insidious
and devastating diseases the world
has ever known.
Syphilis appeared in Spain in 1893,
Immediately after the return of
Columbus; spread to England, France.
Germany, Switzerland and Holland by
1895; appeared along the entire coast
of Africa by 1893, where it had been
carried by other Spanish explorers
and reached India and China by 1905,
according to medical history. 1t even
reached Japan by 1867, despite that
nations isolation. It was brought back
to North America in 1916 when the
first case was discovered in Boston,
154 years after Columbus discovered
America and landed in Haiti
Sir Walter Raleigh entered the
drama when he founded the first Eng
lish colony on Roanoke Island, in
1887 discovered to- acco and started a
general use of American grown to-
bacco. He started the smoke ring
which has spread around the world
and which built up the tremendous
tobacco industry in the United States
including the r. J. Reynolds Tobacco
Company in Winston-Salem. from
which the money for the Smith Rey-
nolds Foundation came.