RACE INFLUENCE AND DISEASE. 817 



RACE INFLUENCE AND DISEASE. 



By G. BERNAED HOFFMEISTER, M. A., M. D. 



IT has been my lot to deal professionally for some years with 

 people of divers colors and races, nations and languages in 

 many different parts of the world, and in varied and constantly 

 changing climates. I have thus had exceptional opportunities 

 and sufficient leisure to ponder over racial variations as they pre- 

 sent themselves to the medical eye. 



Perhaps the most interesting races with whom I have been 

 thrown into contact are the African, and I will consider them 

 first. I have more especially had to do with the natives of East 

 Africa, who are Mohammedans of a somewhat lax and unortho- 

 dox type, and yet, owing to their v implicit acceptance of Moham- 

 med's fatalistic doctrines, their submission to kismet is so com- 

 plete as distinctly to influence the course of their illnesses. 



Indirectly it does so in the following way : When a Sidi-boy 

 incurs, for instance, a wound on his leg, he thinks that if Allah 

 wills that this should get well its healing is certain, but, if the 

 divine wish is otherwise, no human skill or care can do one iota 

 of good ; on this account details of simple dressing and protection 

 are quite neglected by this poor fellow, or as much so as the sur- 

 geon will allow. If under discipline, he is willing to have his 

 name on the sick list for the privileges which belong to it ; but 

 in his heart he despises surgical treatment. Clearly, then, the 

 prognosis with such a case is much worse than it would be in 

 other subjects. 



The same argument applies with much greater force to medi- 

 cal cases, on account of the childlike ignorance which exists 

 among such people as to what disease actually means. 



This extreme and apathetic dependence on fate forms the 

 greatest difficulty with which the physician has to contend. It 

 speaks well for the blind religious faith of these races, and puts 

 to shame many professing Christians on their sick-beds ; but it 

 costs many lives, and entails much extra work on medical attend- 

 ants, who have perhaps to administer remedies with their own 

 hands, and that often under great difficulties and at much per- 

 sonal sacrifice. 



Another more direct point, and one which adds to the gravity 

 of the prognosis, is that these men are not at all anxious to re- 

 cover ; their idea of the value of life is very low, their present 

 existence is usually a hard one, while their religion promises them 

 better times in their heaven, so that if Allah wills to take them 

 they are in luck, and by no means to be pitied. 



Now, we all know what it is in the crisis of a severe illness for 

 vol. xxxviii. 57 



