Volume 1

Handbook of geographical and historical pathology / by August Hirsch ; translated from the second German edition by Charles Creighton.

  • Hirsch, August, 1817-1894.
Date:
1883-1886
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Handbook of geographical and historical pathology / by August Hirsch ; translated from the second German edition by Charles Creighton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

    47/736 (page 25)
    in tlie rest.” In the report of Staberoh for the Paris epidemic of 1837, it is stated d “ In this epidemic, just as in the sad time of the cholera, it was observed that particular parts of the city were spared without conceivable reason, while the neighbouring parts were severely attacked.” In the Boston epidemic of 1825, according to the report of Dewees (1. c.), only the children sickened at its commencement (December), and it was not until the middle of January that adults were seized; also in the Dublin epidemic of 1847, it appears, from the narrative of Churchill (1. c.), to have been the children that suffered. In the epidemic of 1837 Rennes, the malady had become widely distributed through the population as early as February, but, according to Toulmouche (1. c.), it was not until April that it appeared among the inmates of the central prison. § 4. Geographical Distribution. The geographical distribution of influenza extends, with- out doubt, over the whole inhabited globe. From some large tracts of country, such as the West Coast of Africa, and the southern part of South America, no records of influenza epidemics have reached us, and the records for some other countries, such as the Cape, India, Australia and Polynesia, are but scanty; but this does not justify the conclusion that the disease has not been prevalent at all or only rarely in these countries, any more than the silence 01 the scattered notices of the chroniclers and physicians of the middle ages justify us in concluding that the disease was absent or of rare occurrence during that period. That influenza has been observed in several of the regions named, and especially in tropical latitudes, just as often as in Europe and in North America, we learn not only from the records of influenza epidemics as given in the chronological table, but also from the published observations of Bennet,2Ellis,3 Wilkes,4 Caspers ‘ Wochenschr. f. d. ges. Heilkde.,’ 1837, 266. 2 ‘ Lond. Med. Gaz.,’ ix, 631. 3 ‘ Polynesian Kesearches,’ 1836, iii, 35. 4 ‘ U. S. Exploring Expedition,’ iii, 93.