CHAPTER IX. 



DISINFECTION AND DISINFECTANTS * 



The purpose of disinfection is to prevent the spread 

 of the communicable diseases. In its apphcation it 

 aims at the destruction of those minute forms of animal 

 and vegetable life which prey upon both man and 

 animals and cause disease. The discovery of the rela- 

 tionship between living pathogenic agents and disease; 

 of the manner in which these same agents enter and 

 leave the body; and the subsequent determination of 

 reliable methods of destroying them, marked a new 

 epoch in the history of medicine in so far that disinfec- 

 tion was for the first time placed upon a secure founda- 

 tion. As a result, before the unseen terrors of the air 

 and water we no longer wring our hands in abject and 

 helpless misery while thousands of our fellow-beings 

 are smitten by disease! Nor do we inhumanly flee 

 from those afflicted, leaving them not only to the mercy 

 of a cruel sickness, but also to those beasts among 



*For most of the data in this chapter and much in the preceding, the 

 author has drawn freely upon Dr. Rosenau's " Disinfection and Disin- 

 fectants," an incomparable book on the subject; to a lesser extent upon 

 Dr. Sternberg's "Lomb Prize Essay." To both authors he gratefully 

 acknowledges his indebtedness. 



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