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.

    154/976 (page 134)
    in the houses supplied by the Lambeth Company were at the rate of 37 to every 10,000 living; in those supplied by the Southwark and Vauxhall, at the rate of 130 to every 10,000 living. The population drinking the foul water appears to have suffered 3£ times as much as that drinking the purer water. This seems to be an experiment as tree as possible from error. The population submitted to the test being 400,000 500,000; the only ascertainable differences of circumstances in the two classes being in the kind of water supplied. The well- known instance of the sickness following the use of the water of a pump in Broad-street, Golden Square, affords strong evidence of the evil influence of water contaminated with cesspool drainage. Dr. South attributes the severity of Cholera in the winter in Russia to the drinking of water from melted snow collected from the imme- diate neighbourhood of dwelling-houses and on which the Cholera discharges had been thrown. Impure water alone will not neces- sarily produce Cholera. There are instances of freedom from the disease with bad water supply in the same way as there are with vitiated atmospheres already mentioned. Bacl Food.—Mr. Grainger, in his Eeport for the Epidemic of 1848-49, says, “Several marked examples were brought under my notice where violent attacks of Cholera were distinctly traceable to the use of putrid fish, bad pickled pork, decayed cheese, &c.” Dr. Carpenter quotes Dr. Brittan as authority for the fact of an outbreak of Cholera and Choleraic diarrhoea among a number of school children, who had eaten plentifully of spoiled oysters, and by which eleven of the suf- ferers lost their lives. In the earlier days of the appearance of the disease in India it was thought that many attacks were caused by the eating of diseased rice. I remember the case of a gentleman who was attacked a few hours after eating hermetically sealed fish. In this class of causes may be included the noxious effects of purgative medicines given during Cholera. Numerous Indian writers recognise the mischief produced by these. I believe that this is not confined to the saline and liydragogue purgatives only. I have seen milder purgatives followed by Cholera. Sir R. Martin and Twining caution us against administering during Cholera times any purgative medi- cines likely to operate in the early morning; i.e. about the time that the first symptoms of Cholera generally commence. Regiments Marching.—In Madras these seem to have been very liable to Cholera, as shown by Rogers, Lorimer, and Balfour. Erom Dr. Rogers’ Report on the Asiatic Cholera in the regiments of the Madras army from 1828-44, this is shown both for European and native corps. Large bodies or regiments or parties of European recruits en route to join their corps have suffered greatly. On the other hand, treasure parties, consisting of smaller numbers of men, from ten or twenty to a maximum of 100 or 200 men, have suffered little. Thus in the European corps the ratio of marches attacked to marches unattacked has been 23'92 per cent.; in the small parties 2-72 per cent; the officers being comparatively exempt. Dr.