Tuberculosis in the United States : Prepared for the International Congress on Tuberculosis, Washington, September 21 to October 12, 1908. Department of Commerce and Labor.

United States. Bureau of the Census.

Date:: [1908]

Credit: Tuberculosis in the United States : Prepared for the International Congress on Tuberculosis, Washington, September 21 to October 12, 1908. Department of Commerce and Labor. 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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$responsible for 9.7 per cent of the total deaths of the year. Pneu- monia, including bronchopneumonia, came next to tuberculosis as a cause of death, with a percentage of 9.8, then heart disease (8.6 per cent), violence (7.6 per cent), and diarrhea and enteritis (7.1 per cent). For infants and children under 15 years of age, the percentage of deaths from all forms of tuberculosis {according infants and children. to the returns) is low (4 per cent). But many (5), page so. of the deaths from meningitis (unqualified), convulsions, and from diarrhea and enteritis are probably due to tuberculous infection. The story of the dealings of tuberculosis with infancy and childhood is not yet told in the statistics, nor will it be until physicians are much more careful in their certificates of cause of death, and, indeed, until science has rendered it less difficult to obtain precise information in many instances. For youth and early manhood and womanhood (15 to 29 years of age), nearly a third (33.2 per cent) of all of v .u j . u j '^ ' > 'J ^ ■[ _ ' Youth and early manhood the deaths are due to tuberculosis in some of its and womanhood. forms. For females the proportion is even (c^),pages?. higher (38.3 per cent). The mortality from no other cause ap- proaches that from this disease, the nearest being violence (16.8 per cent), typhoid fever (7.4 per cent), pneumonia (6.7 per cent), and heart disease (4.3 per cent). Here is where the most immedi- ately beneficial results of the active campaign against tubercidosis should first be perceived. For mature manhood and womanhood (30 to 44 years) over a quarter (25.6 per cent) of all of the deaths are j^^^^^^ ^^^^^^ ^^^ from tuberculosis, but the relative importance womanhood. of the disease as a cause of death is less because (-D). page 57. of the increased fatality of other diseases. Violence (13.1 per cent), pneumonia (8.8 per cent), Bright's disease (7.5 per cent), and heart disease (7.1 per cent) are the next most important causes, and cancer (4.5 per cent) now makes its appearance as a considerable cause of death. The period from 45 to 59 years is hard to designate; perhaps we may call it the harvest time of life, as it should The harvest time of life, be, after the exertions of mature manhood and (S),page58. womanhood and before the shadows of advancing years become too pronounced. Here tuberculosis ceases to be the most important cause of death; its proportion of the total (12.1 per cent) is reduced to one-half of that of the preceding period. This is because the degenerative diseases begin at these ages rapidly to increase in their efi'ect upon the death rate. Violence declines (8.5 per cent) because the days of most active labor are over, but heart disease (12.5 per cent) now exceeds tuberculosis and becomes the leading cause of death; nephritis and Bright's disease (11 per cent) is close behind; and cancer (10.5 per cent) is almost equally important. 53046—08 3$