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Tuberculosis of all kinds is a disease very closely
associated with poverty, and its attendant conditions.
Overcrowding, badly ventilated houses, intemperance,
and want of proper nourishment, all tend to render persons
living under such conditions more susceptible to the
onset of the disease.
The disease itself is due to a bacillus, and it is infectious.
Persons of all ages are liable to attack, but in
young children the commonest sites of the disease are the
glands, the joints, and the abdomen. In adults by far
the commonest type of the disease is the pulmonary one,
Phthisis, or Consumption. In these cases the organism
causing the infection is very commonly present abundantly
in the expectoration, and in the breath and spray
driven out by coughing. If a person suffering from consumption
spits on the floor or on the street, the spit in
warm weather soon dries up, and the germs in it are
carried about attached to particles of dust, and are a
potential source of infection to any susceptible person.
It is for this reason that consumptives are advised to carry
pocket sputum cups, and to use them for the reception of
the sputum, or to spit into pieces of paper or old linen,
which can be burned in the fire. Open windows and an
open-air life, as far as possible, abstention from alcohol,
and good, nourishing food, all help to sustain the system
against the attacks of the disease, which is usually of
a chronic nature, and may last for years before carrying
off the patient. It was at one time thought that Consumption
was incurable, but greater knowledge has
proved this to be erroneous, and many persons alive and
well at the present day have at one time or other suffered
from the disease; the earlier the disease is discovered, and
the sufferer carries out the appropriate treatment, the
greater the chance of recovery. The establishment of
Tuberculosis Dispensaries, which is now in progress all
over the country, will bring the most modern methods
of diagnosis and treatment almost into the homes of the
people, and the results produced by them by means of
actual treatment of cases, and as educational centres,
should soon be evident. The hearty and intelligent cooperation
of the community at large, and especially of all
sufferers from Tuberculosis, is, however, essential, in
order to produce the best results in the way of diminishing
the incidence of the disease.