LEPKOSY IX THE HAWAIIAN' ISLANDS. 



THE IMtol'OSKl) ESTABLISHMENT OF A GOVERNMENT BAO 

 TERIOLOGIC INSTITUTE. 



The inhabitants of the beautiful Hawaiian Islands, 

 comparatively free from the devastating infectious dis- 

 eases so long as they enjoyed the blessings of isolation 

 from the outside world, have been made painfully aware 

 of the dangers of the dissemination of disease from 

 man to man. They have experienced the benefits and 

 blessings as well as the evils and curses arising to them 

 from a new civilization brought to their palm-clad 

 shores by white men in search of new lands and fabu- 

 lous wealth. Some fifty years ago the first case of lep- 

 rosy came to the little island kingdom from the distant 

 Orient. As usual with the primitive peoples of the 

 islands of the South Seas, this dreadful disease found 

 a fertile soil in the natives, with so little resistance to 

 all infectious diseases, acute or chronic. It spread with 

 alarming rapidity, and it became evident unless rigid 

 measures were enforced in the way of absolute and 

 early segregation, that from this cause alone, the entire 

 population would become practically extinct in less than 

 half a century. In 1866 the number of known lepers 

 had reached 105; in 1876, 677; in 1886, 590; in 1897, 

 1.100, and when I visited the Molokai settlement two 

 years later I found that the number of leper- had 

 reached 1,300. When I visited the islands a second 

 time I was informed that the number of lepers, owing 

 to the fearful mortality among them, had been reduced 

 to 1,100. The nationalities of the lepers is shown by 

 a report made in 1898, of which number 984 were na- 

 tives, 62 half castes, 32 Chinese, and 5 Americans. 



