Volume 1

A system of medicine / edited by J. Russell Reynolds.

Date:
1866-1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A system of medicine / edited by J. Russell Reynolds. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    152/976 (page 132)
    calm, was succeeded by a strong south-west wind which soon dissipated the former stagnant and poisonous atmosphere. In both periods at the end of September the temperature of the Thames fell below G0°; but in 1854 the barometer again increased, the air became again stagnant, and the decline of the disease was considerably checked. It continued however, gradually to subside, although the months of November and December were nearly as misty as that of September.” Climate.—We are not in a position to estimate the precise value of climate upon the intensity of the disease. The statistics of the native populations of India and of nations of the Eastern part of the globe are not sufficiently well known to enable us to compare the virulence of their epidemics with those of Europe. Eor India, we have only the military statistics on which we can rely, but they are of too excep- tional a character to serve the purpose of the inquiry. Whatever may have been the virulence of separate epidemics, there is a much greater frequency of the epidemic in India. Whereas Cholera has visited Europe only twice severely since 1832, the epidemics are of constant occurrence in some parts or other of India. It is doubtful whether there is any relation between the marsh malaria ot a country and Cholera. The question of the influence of climate will be again referred to in the section for mortality and susceptibility. Nature of the Soil.—Cholera has prevailed so severely nearly all over the world, that it is not likely that the soil exerts much influence. Some writers have thought that it has been less severe on the Laterite foundations, in Madras and other places. Dr. Maclelland states that stiff clayey soils have had more mortality than loose sandy and easily drainable Ground. Dr. Lorimer found that nearly half the epidemics examined look place on the black cotton sod. The toIc^c forma- tions of Auvergne escaped in 1832, although surrounded with Cholera fields. Dr. Farr states that in England it was less fatal on the primary geological formations than on others. „ , Elevation above the Sea Level.—The most favoured seats of Cholera all over the world are places not high above the sea ; along the banks of rivers and the estuaries of great streams. In London, the lower elevations were most fatal; and as tire height of the locality mcre^ed mortality decreased. Doubtless this is not from any difference of barometric pressure, but because these situations generally combineso many unfavourable sanitary conditions, as the most moist subsoil, the worst drainage, the least ventilation and air movement, the most im- pure air, and the most dense populations. In London and its neig 1- bnnrhood the mortality was at the rate of lo6 pei 10,0t U m t e lowest districts, viz. Newington, Kotherliithe, St. George s s°uthwark and Bermondsey, about the level of the Thames; and 15 per 10 000 in the hio-hest/viz. Hampstead, Islington, Marylebone and St. lau- cras Tlmre were some exceptions in places m which all sanitay conditions weTe perhaps worse than some of the places of a little i i ’ l (Mini on is less prevalent in mountain elevations than on rieveb Skto Sn the Indian hill stations. They have