London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

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Hackney 1899

Report on the sanitary condition of the Hackney District for the year 1899

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50
the disease if eaten; and where the udder of a milch-cow is affected
with the disease, the milk of such cows, unless sterilized or boiled,
may cause consumption in those drinking it.
It may be here stated, for the encouragement of persons suffering
from consumption, that this disease is curable in certain of its stages ;
and very great improvement by proper treatment has been observed
at nearly all stages of the malady.
From the above short description of consumption of the lungs and
its mode of spread, it will be readily guessed what precautions are
necessary on the part of those suffering from the disease, as well as
the public at large, to prevent the spread of consumption. These
precautions may be given under the following heads:—
(a) Precautions to be Adopted by Patients suffering from Consumption,
or those in charge of such Patients.
1. A consumptive patient should occupy a bedroom alone, or, if
this is impossible, a separate bed.
2. The bedroom should be well lighted and ventilated all day, and
a window left partly open at night. (There are simple contrivances
available for this to be done without creating draughts.)
3. The patient should not spit about the rooms, but only in a
spit-cup or basin containing a small quanitv of disinfectant fluid, or
in paper bags, or paper hankerchiefs, which must be immediately
afterwards destroyed by burning. (Linen or cotton handkerchiefs
should not be used, as the expectoration dries on them, and is, as
pointed out before, scattered into the atmosphere as dust.)
4. When out of doors a tuberculous patient should spit in a
portable spit-cup, which may be obtained of any chemist, containing
a small quantity of disinfectant fluid, and should especially avoid
spitting on the floors of any public conveyance or on the public
pavements.