382 ANNUAL. REPORT OF TllE Off. DoC. 



paper napkin which should be burned. The ordinary handkerchief 

 is dangerous is used to receive the sputum. One sick with tubercu- 

 losis should not be employed in the dairy, for he may infect the milk 

 with his hands, or the straw of the stable with his sputum, which 

 when dried, may get into the milk, where the germs live and multiply. 

 The tubercular patient should hiave his own dishes, which should 

 be washed separately from the other dishes of the family, and arti- 

 cles of food which he does not eat, should be burned, or buried deeply 

 in the ground. After a death from tuberculosis, the room and all 

 that belonged to the patient should be most thoroughly disinfected. 

 The sick-room should be exposed to the air and sunshine so long as 

 possible before it is again used. 



People do not inherit tuberculosis. They may inherit constitu- 

 tions which are susceptible to that disease, and so we often see 

 several cases in the same fam^ily; not because the disease has been 

 inherited, but because it has been communicated by the first case 

 to the others. 



Typhoid fever is also a germ disease, conununicated most com- 

 monly through food and drink. These become contaminated and 

 infected by more or less carelessness. Thus, faecal matter is too 

 often allov.-ed to enter water which may be used for domestic pur- 

 poses. Sewers commonly discharge into streams which lower down 

 are used for drinking purposes. Privies are generally too near 

 wells, and often on higher ground, so that it is entirely possible 

 for drainage on the surface, or underground, to exist directly in 

 the well or spring. If the discharges from a typhoid fever patient 

 enter drinking water, it is almost certain that some of those who 

 use the vrater will contract the disease. If such water is introduced 

 into milk, the disease may be in that way spread, for these germ 

 flourish in that fluid. A person suffering from a mild form of 

 typhoid fever, may, in milking or in cleansing the utensils in a 

 dairy, infect the milk, and epidemics have originated in this manner. 

 Nurses, in handling the sick, have their hands infected and unless 

 they are very careful, they will infect food and drink. The person 

 who nurses one sick with typhoid fever, should not, if possible, cook 

 for the family. Every time she handles the patient, she should 

 most carefully wash her hands. One sleeping with a patient with 

 typhiod fever, may readily contract it. So, also, if there is careless- 

 ness in a family with the discharge from a sick person, the germs 

 may get into the house, dry up, spread about, and many persons 

 come down with the fever. With the utmost care, the disease can 

 be confined to the person who first lakes it. There is no need to 

 quarantine a house with typhoid fever, and there is no need to keep 

 the children home from school. It is well to tie the pump handle, 

 when, in the country-, a funeral occurs from typhoid fever. The 

 water is dangerous to use. It should all be pumped out, a pound of 

 copper sulphate thrown into the well, left there for a day, and the 

 well again pumped dry. 



Cancer has become one of our most prevalent diseases, as well as 

 one of the most fatal. There is no idea that it is inherited, but it 

 distinctly follows in certain families, for the same reason that tuber- 

 culosis does. There is no proof at all existing, that any foods, ani- 

 mal or vegetable, in any way cause cancer. Cancer has been ob- 



