Tobacco v. cholera / M.D.

  • M. D.
Date:
Between 1890 and 1899?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Tobacco v. cholera / M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    SMOKE NOT No. 32. 'Tobacco v. Cholera. To the Editor of the Echo. Sir,—It is amusing to find oft-exploded fallacies re-appearing from time to time, and heralded as new and “ remarkable discoveries.7 The antiquated notion that Tobacco smoke affords an excellent protection against infection, has been repeatedly exposed, but once more it crops up as fresh and vigorous as ever. A few days ago, a telegram reached this country from Berlin, and appeared in the columns of most of the Daily Papers, announcing that two Hamburg doctors had “ made the remarkable discovery, that only a few minutes7 contact with Tobacco leaf, had sufficed to shrivel up the cholera bacillus, to which Tobacco smoke also rapidly proved fatal.77 Now this so-called “ remark¬ able discovery 77 is in reality ancient history. The “ discovery 77 which the two gentlemen referred to have apparently not made, is that Tobacco leaf or the smoke of the burning leaf, will shrivel up and destroy the leucoeytes or white corpuscles of the blood, which are the natural protectors of the body against the invasion of the cholera bacillus and other infectious microbes. The man who chews Tobacco, and the man who smokes, instead of fortifying the system, weakens it, rendering it a more easy prey to the cholera microbes. The fumes of burning Tobacco, like the fumes of burning sulphur, if inhaled, are productive of injurious effects on the tissues of the body. Tobacco is one of the most costly disinfectants ; it is also one of the least effective outside of the body, and one of the most injurious within. Hence it comes that those who use Tobacco are more liable to fall victims to cholera or any other infectious disease which may happen to prevail in a community. If