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13. A consumptive person should occupy a separate bed, and
should not kiss or be kissed upon the lips, but upon the
cheek or forehead.
14. No consumptive mother should give suck.
15. Sunlight and fresh air are the greatest enemies of infection,
and the best treatment is the open air treatment. A
consumptive person need not fear going out in any
weather, if warmly clad.
16. Inflate the lungs well, and always breathe through the
nose.
The breath and perspiration of a consumptive person are not
infectious. If the above rules are carefully attended to, there is no
danger to the healthy in the ordinary intercourse of social and family
life.
4.—Disinfection.-—It is highly desirable that the premises
occupied by a consumptive person should be disinfected on recovery,
removal, or death, and I am adopting that course so far as is possible.
Unfortunately, I do not learn of a case until sometimes a week has
elapsed after death, when the room has been cleansed and put to other
uses, and the occupants are indisposed to submit to the ordeal of
"turning the place upside down." This offers another argument in
favour of voluntary notification, as one would be able to disinfect both
more frequently and earlier. In the cases of the notifiable diseases,
it is no uncommon thing for the Inspectors of Nuisances to learn of
the death of a case, and indeed, for the room to be disinfected, before
the death is returned to me.
I may have occasion at a future time to approach the Council
upon the subject of the open-air treatment of Phthisis, but do not
think the present an opportune moment to discuss the subject.
Plague.—The spread of this disease during last year to
Western Europe and to the Thames created some uneasiness to Port