388 MAN'S IMPROVEMENT OF HIS ENVIRONMENT 



An Experiment in Civic Hygiene. During the summer of 1913 

 an interesting experiment on the relation of flies and filth to disease 

 was carried on in New York City by the Bureau of Public Health 

 and Hygiene of the New York Association for improving the con- 

 dition of the poor. 

 Two adjoining blocks 

 were chosen in a 

 thickly populated part 

 of the Bronx near a 

 number of stables 

 which were the 

 sources of great num- 

 bers of flies. In one 

 block all houses -were 

 screened, garbage pails 

 were furnished with 

 covers, refuse was re- 

 moved and the sur- 

 roundings made as 

 JJW^I sanitary as possible. 

 *** In the adjoining block 

 conditions were left 

 unchanged. During 

 the summer as flies 

 began to breed in the 

 manure heaps near the 

 stables all manure was 

 disinfected. Thus the 

 breeding of flies was 

 checked. The cam- 

 paign of education was 

 continued during the summer by means of moving pictures, 

 nurses, boy scouts, and school children who became interested. 



At the end of the summer it was found that there had been a 

 considerable decrease in the number of cases of fly-carried diseases 

 and a still greater decrease in the total days of sickness (especially 

 of children) in the screened and sanitary block. The table and 



The upper picture shows the stables where millions 

 of flies were bred ; the lower picture, the disinfec- 

 tion of manure so as to prevent the breeding of 

 flies. 



