Our Insane.

employ "sanitary legislation," organize boards of health, and educate the people in all the various methods to prevent disease.

The more thoroughly sanitary science is applied, the more will it serve, not only to prevent disease, but aid in curing it. The more we improve ventilation, drainage, and sewerage; the more we improve the quality of potable water, and the greater the regard given to dietary habits and physical exercise, the higher will be the standard of health in a community, the greater good will be accomplished.

Says Dr. H. I. Bowditch, in his treatise on "Public Hygiene in America."

We stand now at the very dawn of the grandest epoch yet seen in the progress of medicine. While philosophically, accurately, and with the most minute skill, studying by means of physiology, pathological anatomy, chemistry, the microscope, and above all, by careful clinical observation, the natural history of disease and the effect of remedies, our art, at the present day looks still higher: viz., to the prevention as well as the cure of disease. And this is to be done by sanitary organizations throughout each State,-the nation, the laity, and the profession joining hands in this most noble cause. "If by such means one third or more of the sickness and suffering consequent thereto can be averted: if the rate of mortality can be very sensibly diminished, public health everywhere greatly improved and human life prolonged, glorious triumphs are indeed being achieved.

For the prevention of insanity pursue the same course as with other diseases. Study the causes, educate the people therein, and by the united effort of education and legislation it will be accomplished. If intemperance is a cause, remove the cause. If heredity be a cause, let there be a more general education in the principles of physiology, that all classes may have a more correct knowledge of the laws of life and health, so that every individual may understand their own weaknesses, and guard against them, and thus, in the process of time, the constitution will become greatly improved, and the hereditary influences greatly reduced. If high-living and excesses be a cause, let it be known. If over-pressure, and cramming in public schools be a cause, the sooner that be stopped, the better.

It should be the persistent policy of legislation, and of every State, to adopt and execute some systematic means for preventing

Scarlet Fever in the Horse.

insanity, for economic reasons, if for no other. It is expensive as well as folly to go on investing millions of dollars in asylums for the care and cure of the insane, without some effort to remove the cause. Public economy, as well as public weal, and an advancing civilization, demand that something shall be done in this direction.

SCARLET FEVER IN THE HORSE.

OFFICE OF THE STATE VETERINARY SURGEON,

AMES, September 6, 1887.

DR. J. F. KENNEDY, Secretary State Board of Health:

}

DEAR SIR-Sanitarians in various parts of the country have recently had their attention directed to a supposed case of Scarlet Fever affecting a horse in Cedar county, Iowa.

The announcement to the public that a case of Scarlet Fever had been detected in the horse, naturally created a spirit of inquiry on this subject. Our sanitary boards, I think, had entertained some fear of danger from this source. If the horse is capable of receiving and communicating this alarming disease, then the field of the sanitarian is greatly extended. I have received a number of inquiries as to the genuineness of this case, and the probable danger to be anticipated.

I will state that I did not see the case, neither was it examined by any one having official connection with the office of State Veterinary Surgeon, or of our State Board of Health.

The article giving the account of the case was a somewhat sensational one, partaking somewhat more of an advertisement than a dispassionate, scientific paper. I have made several efforts to have the veterinarian, who diagnosed the case, furnish me with a written statement of the history and symptoms, but have as yet, been unsuccessful.

Quarantine-Head of Families.

Permit me to state first, that there is no occasion for anxiety or alarm on this subject. It has been known for a long time that the horse is occasionally affected with an eruptive fever, closely resembling Scarlet Fever of the human patient. It is call Scarlet Fever of the horse, but is not in any sense recognized as a contagious. disease.

It most frequently manifests itself as a sequel to some other debilitating disease, but occasionally develops as a primary affection. Horses have been known to develop this eruptive fever when Scarlet Fever was prevailing to a great extent in the community, but it never assumes the epizootic type extending from animal to animal, nor has it ever been known to be communicated from horse to man.

It is not considered as due to specific virus, but is quite as likely to make its appearance independent of any pre-existing cases of Scarlet Fever, as where this fever is prevalent.

It is misleading to designate this affection as Scarlet Fever, inasmuch as it is regarded, I believe, by all authorities on comparative pathology, as non-contagious.

M. STALKER, State Veterinary Surgeon.

QUARANTINE-HEAD OF FAMILIES.

Over and over again the question is asked: "Should heads of families be quarantined in infectious diseases?" An uniform answer cannot be given. In no two instances are the circumstances、 alike. The sole purpose of quarantine and isolation is protection against infection. As a general rule it is safest and best to quarantine an entire family-especially in Small-pox and Scarlet Fever, yet there are many instances where a quarantine of the father, who is the bread-winner for the family, would be not only vexatious,

Infectious Diseases in Public Schools.

but unnecessary. The local board, with its health officer, especially where the health officer is the attending physician, are the only competent and proper authority to decide who, and under what circumstances, such persons may be exempt from quarantine.

When a patient is completely isolated from other parts of the house, and other members of the family, there can be no objection to giving the father, if he does not resort to the sick room, and especially if his business does not call him among children, nor into gatherings of people, as much liberty as is given the attending physician, who goes into the sick room, takes off his overcoat, in immediate contact with the patient takes its temperature, returns the thermometer to its case, with or without disinfection, perhaps without even wiping it, puts on his overcoat and in a few moments visits another family where are children susceptible to the disease. To rigidly quarantine the father and not the physician would be an absurdity. Consistency should govern in health matters as in other things.

The safest, and only safe plan is, for local boards to have special supervision of each infected family, and then, in the interest of the public health, establish and maintain quarantine, impartially and rigidly. Simply giving notice and posting danger signals are not enough. If, in their judgment, any member of a family can be safely relieved from its restrictions, let the board so declare, and upon what conditions, but this must be done by the board in session. It cannot be delegated to a committee, say the Supreme Court. Neither can individual members of a local board direct a health officer or a physician to "go ahead and do the best he can to stop the disease. The order or instruction must come from the board, in session, and be of record.

1

Potable Water.

POTABLE WATER.

Much has been said and written about water analysis, and what constitutes good potable water; and on the other hand, what renders water dangerous as a drink. In 1868, the United Kingdom of Great Britain appointed a commission to inquire into the best means of preventing the pollution of rivers. The commission was styled the "Rivers Pollution Commission." After continuing their labors for six years, in 1874 they made a final report. They examined in all one thousand two hundred and seventy four samples of potable

water.

The following tables, shown by Charles Ekin, Chemist, London, in his book, "Potable Water", embodies their idea of typically good and typically bad water, and the nearer each type is reached by inference, the nearer are we to a safe or dangerous potable water. Result of analysis expressed in parts per one hundred thousand. (1)

(1) Parts in 100,000 can be converted into grains, per imperial gallon, hy multiplying by 7 and then moving the decimal point one place to the left. An imperial gallon contains 70,000 grains. A United States gallon 58,328 grains.