View report page

185
[1913
TRADES AND BUSINESSES CARRIED ON IN THE HOMES OF
PATIENTS.
The list of trades and businesses carried on in the homes of the patients
or in the houses in which they resided which is given below, proves very
conclusively that the spread of infectious diseases through the goods made in
the homes, or in the case of tenements, in the houses wherein they reside, is
very possible.
From this list it is seen that Scarlet Fever occurred in 155 houses in which
a business was conducted or work done; also Diphtheria in 66, Enteric Fever
in 6, and Erysipelas in 27. In every instance the most careful inquiry was
made as to the possibility of the disease being bspread by the articles sold or
made on the premises, and in the case of Scarlet Fever, the work especially
if it were connected with wearing apparel, was at once stopped, either until
the patient (if kept at home; had recovered, or, if removed to hospital, until
the house had been disinfected, and the period of the incubation of the
disease had passed, and, where necessary, the goods, if wearing apparel, had
been disinfected. In these cases, too, the individual firms to whom they
belonged were communicated with.