322 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



against human enemies who will probably never come. Surely we can 

 spare one half of this sum for foes who will surely and inevitably kill a 

 million and a half of our people this very year, if we do not stop the 

 slaughter. 



Material equipment and the provision of a standing army of experts 

 is, however, only a part of the necessary preparation for the war against 

 disease. The reserves are always at the front in its battles, and the 

 warfare is a guerilla warfare in which each one must do his part. Edu- 

 cation is the key-note of the modern campaign for public health. Tu- 

 berculosis and infant mortality are preeminent among all the causes of 

 preventable disease and death as the greatest scourges, from the abate- 

 ment of which the largest results for humanity are to be attained. In 

 each case the fight must be won, not merely by the construction of 

 public works, but by the conduct of the individual life. The same 

 thing is true with regard to the spread of the acute contagia, the burden 

 of venereal disease, the obscure ill effects of defective eyes and ears and 

 teeth, and a dozen other problems which in greater or less degree con- 

 cern the public health. In every one of these cases the results we are 

 striving for can only be reached by spreading a clear knowledge of the 

 ways in which disease spreads, and the ways in which it is prevented, 

 among the mothers who bring up babies and the men who pay rent in 

 the tenement and work in the stores and factories. 



As an illustration of what may be done along this line of public 

 education I may cite the efforts being made by the New York State 

 Department of Health to bring about a more effective contact between 

 the expert who has the knowledge and the individual citizen who must 

 make use of it. 



The monthly bulletin of the department is our official organ of com- 

 munication with the public, and this bulletin we have first of all at- 

 tempted to popularize and to convert into an effective medium of 

 education. We have changed its name to Health News. We have 

 banished from its columns all long and technical discussions (which 

 when necessary are issued as Special Bulletins to a selected mailing 

 list). We have ^attempted to print in each number half a dozen brief 

 articles on timely health topics by men of national reputation in their 

 respective fields. We have paid special attention to real news items 

 in regard to current sanitary problems and sanitary progress in the 

 state. Each number is illustrated with cartoons, diagrams and photo- 

 graphs. The edition has been enlarged to over 30,000 copies, and it is 

 mailed during the winter months to each of the 15,000 school princi- 

 pals in the state. We look forward in the future to a day when biology 

 and public health shall occupy not a subordinate, but a central position 

 in the school curriculum. 



In order to come in touch with a wider public than we can hope to 



