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BOROUGH OF HORNSEY.
Advice to Persons Suffering from
Consumption.
1. The safety of your family and of those with whom you
associate, as well as your own chances of recovery, depend on your
following these rules.
2. The material which you cough up and spit (the sputum)
contains the infection of consumption. If this is allowed to become
dry and to get broken into dust, such dust when inhaled
will produce the disease in others, and will also cause fresh disease
in your own lungs.
3. Great care must therefore be used, so that the sputum is
not discharged on any spot or into any substance on which it can
be dried and subsequently broken into dust.
4. It must, therefore, not be discharged on the floor or walls
of any living room, workshop, meeting room, theatre, or other
confined place in which people assemble. It must not be discharged
into a pocket handkerchief carried in the usual manner,
since it readily dries in such a situation, so that not only are the
clothes infected, but, when the pocket handkerchief is again used,
a cloud of infective dust is scattered around you.
5. There are various ways in which this danger may be
avoided.
At home you should spit into a piece of paper or clean rag,
carefully clean your mouth with it, and then throw the soiled
rag or paper on the fire.
If there is no fire you should spit into a cup containing water,
which must be emptied into the drains outside the house, and
then thoroughly cleansed with boiling water before being again
used.
Outside the home you may carry a pocket spittoon charged
with moistened blotting paper. This may te readily obtained at
any chemists. It is essential that the lid should fit tight, and
that the spittoon should be kept clean.