49 



coinplishinents in advertisements in tlie newspapers. Mucli is to be ex- 

 pected from tlie teacliing of sanitary science in onr scliools. 



Since it was discovered tliat tul)ercnlosis is a cnrable disease, a num- 

 ber of countries and States lia^e establislied institutions wliere such sick 

 can be treated. Germany ieads in tliis worlv. Some of the institutions are 

 tent colonies in the forests. Out-of-door life, plain food and drinli, pure 

 air, little or no medicine, that is all that is required. The nostrums ad- 

 vertised in the newspapers are of no value. Nature simply needs a chance 

 to correct the difficultj\ When the disease has once fully taken hold, little 

 is to be expected from any form of treatment, and only too often the real 

 nature of the disease is not recognized until it is too late. It is possible 

 to recognize the early stages of tuberculosis, and that is the time for be- 

 ginning treatment ; beginning in the pre-tubercular stage is still better. 

 With flames bursting from e^'ery window, we do not look for the firemen 

 to save the building, but we rather expect it of. them when they arrive at 

 the stage of much smoke and a tiny tiame. 



There are at least 25,000 individuals .-iffiicted with tuberculosis in our 

 State today, and 5,000 die anuualh^ in Indiana from this disease ; in addi- 

 tion many die from pneumonia and other respiratory diseases, and of af- 

 fections dependent on a polluted atmosphere. Shall we imitate Germany 

 and a number of our sister States and attempt to save these lives, or shall 

 we let disease elimination go on unhindered? Sooner or later the process 

 of elimination will reach our own families, it may reach us individually. 



But, you may say. it will require an innnense institution to take care 

 of so many sick. So it would if all were to be admitted, but we can at 

 once exclude those who are mortally ill and who can not recover, and if we 

 also exclude those who are able to pay for treatment at a private institu- 

 tion, the number would be considerably i-educed. We need scarcely con- 

 sider the argument that if the State allows its citizens to get sick from 

 preventable disease, it should also take care of those sick. 



As a matter of fact many institutions, even State institutions, can not 

 take care of more than a hundred, or at most a few hundred of the acutely 

 sick. Wliat then, you say, is the use of attempting to save the few and let 

 the many perish? That is one way of looking at it. But if we look at a 

 State Hospital as being a school for missionaries in the cause of pure air 

 and right living, we get a different conception of the problem. It is not a 

 question of saving a ffw out of the many lives now going to waste and 



4— A. OF SCIENfE. 



