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THE INFLUENCE OF THE ATMOSPHERE ON OUR 



HEALTH AND COMFORT IN CONFINED 



AND CROWDED PLACES 



By LEONARD HILL, MARTIN FLACK, 1 JAMES McINTOSH, 

 R. A. ROWLANDS, H. B. WALKER 



(From the Physiological Laboratory of the London Hospital Medical College 

 — London Hospital Research Fund ) 



INTRODUCTION 



It is generally thought and taught that the ill effects which arise 

 from ill-ventilated houses, factories, workshops, theaters, — from 

 stuffy and crowded rooms where many people congregate together- 

 are due to alterations in the chemical quality of the air. The 

 purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that no evidence has yet 

 been brought forward which shows that the chemical quality of the 

 air has anything to do with these ill effects, and that, apart from 

 the influence of infecting bacteria, the ventilation problem is essen- 

 tially one of the temperature, relative humidity, and movement of 

 the air. In Germany this point of view has been upheld by that dis- 

 tinguished hygienist, Fliigge, and he and his co-workers have con- 

 tributed a series of papers in which convincing evidence is adduced. 

 In England, Haldane and Lorrain Smith have advanced the same 

 view, and we find it expressed in the evidence given to the Depart- 

 mental Committee of the Home Office on the Humidity and Ventila- 

 tion of Cotton Weaving Sheds. (Haldane, Pembrey, Leonard Hill, 

 etc.) Confirmatory evidence has been brought forward in America 

 by Billings, Weir Mitchell, and Bergey. 



In all the elementary text-books of hygiene, and in most of the 

 standard works, the chemical aspect of the question is treated as if 

 it were the fundamental factor, and this opinion, widely reiterated in 

 the daily press and in daily conversation, has become accepted as an 

 article of faith. 



1 Working during the tenure of the Eliza Ann Alston Research Scholarship 

 Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, Vol. 60, No. 23 



