Diphtheria : its prevention, restriction and suppression / Issued by the Illinois state board of health, 1907.

  • Illinois. Department of Public Health.
Date:
1907
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Diphtheria : its prevention, restriction and suppression / Issued by the Illinois state board of health, 1907. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    PKEVENTION, RESTRICTION AND SUPPRESSION. Diphtheria is a preventable disease. A rigid observance of the rules of the State Board of Health will often prevent the introduction of the disease, and is always followed by a limitation of the disease to the first case or cases. If diphtheria spreads from one house to another some one is to blame. The parents who permit their children to enter a house in which they know, or suspect, there is a case of diph- theria, or to play or mingle with children from that house, need not attribute the sickness and subsequent death of one of their loved ones to the mysterious dispensation of Divine Providence. The parents who fail to make known the existence of diphtheria in their houses, who allow the children of their families to go to school and mingle otherwise with other children, and who, during the period of sickness, disregard all health laws and sanitary precautions, are morally responsible for what- ever sickness and death may occur through their negligence. Observe the Golden Rule. The local health authorities, who, after being advised of the presence of diphtheria in a family, fail to quarantine the premises, and to insist on the isolation of the patient and compliance with all precautions neces- sary to prevent the spread of the disease, are gnilty of culpable negligence. During the existence of diphtheria or scarlet fever in a community, all cases of sore throat with fever are to be looked upon with suspicion until their innocent character is established. Whenever a child has sore throat and fever, he or she should be at once separated from other members of the family until a physician has passed an opinion on the nature of the ailment. This precaution should never be neglected, especially if the child vomits or has a chill, or is sluggish and languid, and looks heavy-eyed. By '^separated is meant placed in a room apart as far as possible from other rooms in the house. From this room all other children must be kept. A child is attacked with diphtheria usually within two or four days, after exposure. The disease may come on within 12 hours after the child has come in'contact with the poison, and, again, no symptoms may develop until the seventh day. If a child does not show signs of illness by the tenth day it can be safely concluded that the disease has not been contracted. A child known to have been exposed should be carefully watched for a week or ten days, and on the slightest sign of illness, be separated from all others.