Report on an outbreak of typhoid fever at Omaha, Nebr. - (1909-1910) / by L.L. Lumsden. The water supply of Williamson, W. Va., and its relation to an epidemic of typhoid fever / by W.H. Frost.

  • Lumsden, L. L. (Leslie Leon), 1875-1946
Date:
[1910]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Report on an outbreak of typhoid fever at Omaha, Nebr. - (1909-1910) / by L.L. Lumsden. The water supply of Williamson, W. Va., and its relation to an epidemic of typhoid fever / by W.H. Frost. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    59/112 (page 47)
    RECOMMENDATIONS. 1. The improvement of the water supply obtained from the Missouri River.—Of the measures required to make this water reasonably free from dangerous pollution, the following are indicated: (a) The abandonment of the intake at the Burt street station as soon as practicable. This is particularly advisable, even if the water supply is to be subjected to purification processes much more efficient than those which have been and are now in operation, because the water at this intake is polluted not only with sewage in the river from more distant sources, but also with the sewage from Florence and from a northwest section of the city of Omaha, having a popula- tion of several thousand, and at times of high water with the contents of privies located within a few hundred feet of the intake. There is also contamination of the water at this point by drainage from the dumping ground of Council Bluffs, Iowa, on the east side of the river. None of the processes usually adopted as practicable for the improvement on a large scale of polluted surface river water should be relied upon to remove absolutely all disease-producing organisms. Therefore the water to be treated should be protected as thoroughly as practicable from pollution, particularly near-by pollution, with sewage. If it is not practicable to abandon the intake at the Burt street station, measures should be taken to prevent dangerous pollu- tion. of the river between the Burt street and the Florence intakes. Among the measures necessary to accomplish this would be the changing of the course of the Omaha and the Florence sewers so that their sewage would not empty into the river above the Burt street intake. (b) The protection of the Florence intake from pollution entering the river through Mill Creek. This could be accomplished either by moving the intake to a point above the mouth of the creek or by changing the course of the creek so that it would empty below the intake. If it is not feasible at present to secure protection of the water at the Florence intake against the contents of Mill Creek by changing the present relative positions of the creek’s mouth and the intake, a considerable safeguard could be accomplished by proper disposal of the sewage on the watershed of the creek for 2 or 3 miles upstream, so that the contents of privies and cesspools wouldnot empty or drain into the creek. (c) The treatment of the water supply by some purification process or processes which will render it free from dangerous pollution. Judging from an inspection of the watershed on each side of the river for a distance of about 10 miles above Florence and from reports as to amounts of sewage entering the river at points farther north, it appears probable that water taken from the Missouri River at any point between 200 and 1,000 feet north of (or upstream from) the