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9
hospital. If the patient cannot be removed to a hospital, then
he should be so isolated that only the person acting as nurse should
remain in the room of the sick person, and that all the excretions of
the patient should be, so soon as passed, submitted to the action of a
disinfecting solution and removed from the room as quickly as
possible; and that, so soon as practicable, the room, bedding, and
clothing, which have been used by the patient, should be thoroughly
disinfected.
There appears to me to be no practical advantage in saying that
one kind of fever is more contagious than another; it may be so;
but as all those diseases above enumerated are contagious, the same
mode of preventing the spreading of them, with, perhaps, some
modifications, should be adopted.
As enteric fever is now prevalent in London, and elsewhere, it is
my intention, in all cases of that disease which come under my
notice, to cause such means to be adopted as will destroy the germs,
or contagium, of the disease. The germs are said to be minute living
organisms, and are supposed to be the principal agent in producing
disease.
Mr. Simon, in the note at page 25, in his Supplementary Report
to the Local Government Board, dated 29th July, 1874, speaks of
small-pox, diphtheria, scarlet-fever, and enteric fever, as dangerously
infective diseases, and adds that, every tangible discharge which
passes from the patient, every sheet, or towel, or handkerchief, which
any discharge from him has fouled, should be so treated as to prevent
the spreading of his infection.
It is now universally admitted by the more eminent medical
practitioners, that the discharge from the bowels of patients suffering
from enteric fever have, in innumerable instances, been the apparent
cause of the spreading of that disease. In dealing with the best
means of preventing contagious diseases, it is necessary that the
kindly co-operation of the medical profession should be solicited by
the District Medical Officer of Health, in carrying into effect those
measures of prevention which experience has pointed out to be the
best. I believe that the best way of Medical Officers of Health
obtaining the co-operation of the medical profession, in dealing with
contagious diseases, is for the Medical Officer of Health to be independent
of private practice; for, unless that be the case, it can
hardly be expected, in every case, that the cordial co-operation of
the medical profession will be given. It is, however, most desirable
in the interest of the public health, that the District Medical Officer
of Health should be furnished, as early as possible, with the fact of