88 
SANITAKY NOTES. KHARTOUM 
Markets 
Cold storage 
Infectious 
diseases 
Notifiable 
diseases 
Markets. —These are interesting places, and have undergone several changes of late years. 
Proper sheds have been built, the floor of the meat market has been cemented, and the 
butchers are required to supply zinc-covered tables. The latter are railed off, so the general 
public cannot sprawl over them and handle the meat, as was formerly the case. Dogs are now 
excluded, save when the Egyptian policeman fails to observe a hungry pariah prowling about 
under his very nose—too frequent an occurrence. To do him justice, when his attention is 
directed to the matter, he makes up for his negligence by the energy with which he expels the 
intruder. 
Tripe and internal organs generally are sold in a special place. The filthy habit of 
inflating the lungs by blowing down the trachea was in vogue, but this practice has been 
stopped and bellows are provided for the purpose. 
The fish market is provided with brick and cement slabs, but might be improved if money 
was forthcoming. The frying of fish is one of our few noxious industries. Still, being 
conducted in the open air, it causes very little nuisance. 
The fowl market is not a cheerful spot, the birds being crowded into small wooden coops 
which are piled one on the top of the other. Fowls are treated with great cruelty in the Bast, 
and I think efforts should be made to improve their lot generally. Apart from the humanitarian 
point of view, it would pay to see that they are better looked after, and not carried about in 
bunches with their legs tied together and often left lying in the hot sun. The poor creatures 
must frequently perish for lack of water. Moreover, the methods of storage expose the fowls 
to the attacks of lice, mites and ticks. They often get into a miserable condition through the 
irritation and loss of blood produced by these parasites, while, as will be shown, spirochastosis 
is common amongst them. So is scaly leg, fowl diphtheria, and most of these avian diseases 
predisposed to by lack of care and cleanliness and by overcrowding. 
If only funds were available, much might be done by erecting tick-proof fowl-houses and 
by aiding the vendors to improve their stock. As it is, no means are available for this 
purpose, which is one reason why chicken meat is often so tough and unsavoury in Khartoum. 
The young pigeons suffer less, not being confined in the same way. Turkeys die of 
tuberculosis, pneumoconiosis, avian diphtheria, and several other complaints. I have known 
one succumb to a malignant tumour of the brain, a glio-sarcoma perforating the skull. 
In the suk, jerked meat (dried in the sun) is sold, so is fish—flesh, bone, and cartilage 
being all crushed up together till it is impossible to tell from mere inspection of what the 
mass consists. It is well cured and seems wholesome. The sale of partially dried and 
stinking animal intestines, beloved by the Sudanese, has been prohibited, though they 
would appear to be able to devour such abomination with impunity. Its very odour, 
however, constitutes a nuisance. 
Cold storage would benefit the food supply in Khartoum, and so would careful attention 
to the rearing of fowls, and the improvement of breeds in cattle and sheep. Cold stoi'age 
plants on the river steamers would enable venison, guinea fowl, fruit, and other delicacies to 
reach the Khartoum market, while refrigerators might also be useful on the trains running 
to and from Port Sudan. 
Lastly, we proceed to discuss :— 
Infectious Diseases .—It may be said at once that, considering its latitude, Khartoum 
is wonderfully free from communicable disease. Absolutely reliable statistics cannot be 
presented, although notification is in force, but each year we can gain a very fair idea of 
the extent to which infectious disease is present and in which forms it has existed. The 
following diseases are notifiable: — 
Anthrax, Beri-beri, Cerebro-spinal Fever, Chicken-pox, Cholera, Dengue, Diphtheria, 
Dysentery, Erysipelas, Filariasis, Glanders, Enteric Fever, Hydrophobia, Leishmaniosis 
