1 78 The Story of the Bacteria 



Malaria ravages large districts, because we 

 do not drain the puddles and will not harden 

 our hearts against the mosquito. 



Typhoid fever claims its victims singly 

 and in wholesale more than thirty thousand 

 die every year in the United States chiefly 

 because we are not yet ready to see that our 

 sewage is disposed of elsewhere than in our 

 drinking waters. 



Tuberculosis, the king of the revels in this 

 dance of death, ends a lingering illness in 

 fully one hundred and fifty thousand persons 

 annually in this country alone. And these 

 multitudes perish prematurely because we 

 do not insist upon the most obvious require- 

 ments of personal hygiene and the simplest 

 details of public and private sanitation. 



In fact, our science is far ahead of our prac- 

 tice, and it now rests largely with the people and 

 the health officials whom they select to guard 

 their interests to say whether or not in the 

 next decade we shall enter into our birthright. 



It is not difficult to suggest broadly the 

 things which must be done if we are to profit 

 as we may by the promise of preventive medi- 



