FIFTEENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART X 659 



the slaughter method since under the slaughter method disinfection 

 of premises must go on just, the same and isolation of the premises 

 from new stock looked after. The attitude of the owner should be 

 better as his business would be harmed much less and therefore his 

 cooperation with the plan more hearty, getting outbreaks or sus- 

 picions of outbreaks reported so much earlier as to be of material 

 benefit and assistance to the system. In short, public opinion could 

 be incorporated in this plan easier and its forceful energy would be 

 felt and soon recognized as an efficient force in control work. It is 

 doubtful if in actual practice today such a plan could be made to 

 operate successfully except in rare instances because we do not have 

 a properly informed and willing public to do the cooperating. 



Whichever method we may finally adopt to control foot and mouth 

 disease or any other contagion, let us remember these facts regard- 

 ing all Infectious diseases. In the first place, we hear little of con- 

 tagious diseases in a new country, as a rule. Many people believe 

 that this is due to climate, soil or water, but the same is true of pests 

 affecting our field crops, and as livestock population increases in 

 density on the soil so do the infectious diseases increase to prey upon 

 the host. This fact is world history regarding the infectious diseases 

 of man and the lower animals as well. It is as true and firm as the 

 hills. It is a fact that must be met squarely. Man's answer is that 

 rigid quarantine of the causative factor once located, coupled with 

 careful disinfection, has made tropical pest holes and plague-ridden 

 tenements fit for the habitation of man or beast. This has been dem- 

 onstrated a fact repeatedly. Wherever this work has been accom- 

 plished, however, it has been under the guiding hand of a scientifically 

 trained head selected for efficiency and tact and bearing a reputation 

 for results accomplished because of a knowledge of the subject in 

 hand. No attention can be given to partisan politics of factional de- 

 sires in making these selections, for sanitation and politics are as 

 incompatible as water and oil. Livestock losses in the United States 

 annually exceed two hundred millions of dollars. Iowa's loss often 

 exceeds twenty millions and is always several millions annually. With 

 increasing livestock values these losses become of more and more 

 vital importance. 



We are fully sensible to the fact that we are an agricultural coun- 

 try first, last and all the time. Our every industry is dependent upon 

 the successful progress of our agricultural activity and just as cer- 

 tainly are we aware that the continued success of a profitable agricul- 

 ture in our country is dependent upon the possibilities of successful 

 livestock production. 



Let us rise out of this baffling network of superstition and the hazy 

 idea that mere luck and good fortune or ill governs the destinies of 

 our agricultural activities and instead turn the light of science based 

 upon coherent investigation to control this great source of annual loss 

 to agriculture and the world. To do this may involve the postpone- 

 ment or surrender of private interests and the abandonment at times 

 of local advantages but compensation will be found in the assurance 

 that the common interest is served and the general welfare advanced. 



