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TUBERCULOSIS AND LAUNDRY WORKERS.
S. Bernheim and A. Roblot (Zeit. f. Tuber., Band viii, Heft 1) call attention
to the danger of the spread of Phthisis by means of the soiled linen from
tuberculous patients. The authors have been struck by the large number of
men and women engaged on work at laundries who attend at the antituberculosis
dispensaries in Paris, and who, if questioned, state that very many of
their companions have died of phthisis. Statistics bear out the impression thus
obtained. Laënnec, for example, states that 143 out of 238 men and women
engaged in laundry work who died during five years died from phthisis. The
authors believe that the mortality from phthisis amongst laundry workers, at
any rate those belonging to the small laundries, is higher than the mortality
from the fame cause amongst nurses. There can be no doubt that inoculation
with the tuberculous virus may occur as a result of handling the linen from
tuberculous patients, and Foa has made an observation on five cases in which
tuberculous nodules developed under such circumstances. At the same time a
profound negligence is shown both by the public and the laundry workers in the
treatment of linen which may be contagious. The authors examined the handkerchiefs,
the serviettes, and the bed linen of tuberculous patients, and demonstrated
the presence of Koch's bacilli. To lessen the danger of spread of
infection the authors recommend:—(1) That the linen should be taken away
from the houses in boxes or bags, which should be disinfected before they are
returned. (2) that there should be a preliminary disinfection of the linen on
its arrival at the laundry, the disinfection to take place preferably within the
boxes or bags in which the linen has been brought; (3) that the reception and
disinfecting room should be altogether separate from the washing room; (4)
that there should be one set of vehicles for taking the soiled linen from the
houses, and that these vehicles should be often disinfected, while the clean
clothes should be delivered from another set of vehicles. The Ministry of
Commerce published regulations on the subject in 1905, which would have
been satisfactory enough if carried out; but the regulations were not to come
into operation at once, and some of them not for three years, by which time
they will probably have sunk out of sight. The difficulty of pressing such
regulations under present conditions is obvious, because the price of carrying
them out would be prohibitive for the smaller laundries, but at the same time
the precautions are needed in the interests both of the workers at the laundries
and of the general public.—(Epitome British Medical Journal, March 3, 1906.)
CEREBROSPINAL FEVER.
Extracts from a memorandum dated July, 1905, on cerebro-spinal fever, by
Mr. W. H. Power, C.B., F.R.S , Medical Officer of the Local Government
Hoard.
Cerebro-spinal fever is not of rare occurrence in the United Kingdom. In
the course of the last forty years this malady is known to have been prevalent
in a considerable number of different localities in England and Wales, several
of these local outbreaks having taken place in recent years. In some instances
they have formed the subject of investigation by a medical Inspector of the
Local Government Board whose report has usually been made public.
Occurrences of cerebro-spinal fever have also boon observed in Scotland and in
Ireland. There is indeed, as will appear later, reason for belief that this.