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149
Owing to possible confusion between Cerebro-spinal Fever
(Spotted Fever) and Polio-myelitis, it is advised that both should be
considered together, and added to the Schedule of Compulsory
Notifiable Diseases, as the first step towards administrative control.
This is necessary in order to obtain early information of the presence
of one or other of these diseases in a district.
It seems that, as regards its degree of infectiousness, the method
of spread and the nature of the preventive measures demanded,
Cerebro-spinal Fever is closely similar to Polio-myelitis. The symptoms
of the two diseases in typical cases present marked points of
difference, but experience has taught that Cerebro-spinal Fever may
also appear in mild or anonymous forms which render its identification
difficult. This circumstance has led to its being mistaken in this
country for Sunstroke, Enteric Fever, Pneumonia, and Influenza. It
is therefore necessary to be on the outlook for such cases when
Cerebro-spinal Fever occurs in a locality; or when agencies not
clearly referable to a definable cause prevail in a particular neighbourhood.
While it is generally believed that Infantile Paralysis is becoming
of more frequent occurrence, this belief may be due to the fact that
the condition is getting more frequently recognised, It should
also be added that our knowledge with reference to the cause and
methods of spread of this disease are anything but complete. There
does not seem to be any marked association between the sanitary condition
of the houses and the disease. Outbreaks generally occur
during the hottest months of the year. Several of those who have
had an experience of the disease in its epidemic form take the view
that it is largely disseminated through dust; others maintain that
there is evidence of flies acting as disseminators of the infection ; and
the measures adopted in the outbreaks in the West of England have
comprised:
(1) The compulsory notification of the disease.