Manual of military hygiene for the military services of the United States / by Valery Havard ... illustrated with seven plates and two hundred and twenty-eight engravings.

  • Havard, Valery, 1846-1927.
Date:
1909
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Manual of military hygiene for the military services of the United States / by Valery Havard ... illustrated with seven plates and two hundred and twenty-eight engravings. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

    27/540
    MILITARY HYGIENE CHAPTER I. MORBIDITY AND MORTALITY IN THE MILITARY SERVICE. As late as the middle of the 19th Century, the crowding of soldiers in ill-ventilated barracks and the neglect of all hygienic rules resulted in the free dissemination of infectious germs and in enormous rates of disease and death in garrisons, several times higher than in civil life. But since the Crimean War in Europe and the Civil War in America, with the progress of scientific medicine, it has become more and more evident that most of the military morbidity and mortality can be prevented by giving soldiers sufficient air space and the benefit of intelligent sanitary regulations. In time of peace, soldiers are presumed to be comfortably quartered, properly fed and clothed, subject to wise hygienic rules and, to a large extent, guarded from excesses and dangerous exposure by military discipline. They are, besides, chosen men, physically sound when enlisted or mustered in. Under such conditions one would ex- pect them to enjoy at least as good health as males of the same age in civil life. It is true that the danger of conveying disease by contact, direct or indirect, in barracks, even when sufficiently roomy, is ever present and cannot be overlooked. The question is complicated by several interacting factors which add to the difficulty of reaching a clear conclusion. According to the United States census of 1900, the male population of military age, namely between 20 and 39 years inclusive, was 12,466,309; during the year, this population suffered a mortality of 95,070, or at the rate of 7.62 per thousand. For the period of life from 20 to 29, the rate was 7.11. So far as it is possible to ascertain, England, France and Germany have about the same ratio of civil mortality, being a little less in Germany and a little more in France. How then does military mortality compare with the above? By con- sulting the official reports of the last few years, years of peace, the figures appear quite favorable to military life. Thus we find that for