39° 



The Review of Reviews. 



Octoter 1, 1906. 



THE SCOURGE OF THE AGE. 



How TO Stamp out Tuberculosis. 

 Mr. J. Hericourt, writing in La Revue recently, 

 discusses the fight against tuberculosis, and suggests 

 measures much more drastic than any which 

 specialists have yet ventured to advocate. He sees 

 no reason why tuberculosis should not be stamped 

 out, like leprosy. His article refers naturally to 

 tuberculosis among the poorer classes in France. 



THE NECESSITY OP STATISTICS. 



To begin with, Dr. Hericourt says, we have no 

 reliable statistics of the number of persons suffer- 

 ing from tuberculosis. In France we are told that 

 the annual mortality from tuberculosis is r 50,000, 

 and in Paris alone tuberculosis claims about one- 

 fourth of the deaths. These figures are very mis- 

 leading, for they refer merely to the mortalit%- from 

 the disease and give no idea of its morbidity. For 

 i>ne death how many sufferers are there? Neither 

 hvgienists nor doctors can answer this question. 

 What we require to know is what proportion of the 

 total population of a country or a city may be de- 

 scribed as suffering from tuberculosis. Accurate 

 statistics may be difficult to obtain, but they are 

 the only basis on which the work of dealing with 

 the disease must rest. 



WHAT CONSTITUTES TCBEECULOSIS? 



Here, however, a new difficulty arises. Some 

 doctors do not pronounce cases as tuberculosis until 

 all the symptoms of the disease are written in capital 

 letters ; others apply the term tuberculosis to the 

 first and often insensible manifestations of the 

 maladv. In the latter category would be included 

 many anaemic and neurotic persons showing as yet 

 no local signs of the disease. The writer thinks 

 it would be well to include all possible cases, no 

 matter in what stage, marked or otherNvise, for he 

 is of opinion that tuberculosis is more common than 

 is generally admitted. It would then be realised 

 that scarcely a family exists without one case, 

 though it mav be the victims very often have the ap- 

 pearance of good health : that in large cities tuber- 

 culosis in a contagious form exists in almost every 

 house; and that in certain poor arrondissemenis of 

 Paris all the people may be pronounced tuberculous. 

 Perhaps public opinion would be moved to recog- 

 nise that it needs something more than conferences 

 to deal with the problem when it is known that 

 houses in which bread and articles of clothing are 

 made are inhabited by tuberculous persons whose 

 clothes, handkerchiefs, and hands spread con- 

 tagious infection. 



WSY RECENT MEASURES HAVE FAILED. 



So far the agitation aroused has practically been 

 without any results as regards the elimination of 

 so implacable a foe. Sanatoriums have been con- 

 structed, dispensaries have been established, and in 



certain schools inspection has been organised. But 

 what have these praiseworthy efforts amounted to ? 

 Very little. 



THE EIGHT TO HEALTH. 



Tlie disease, continues the writer, may be fought 

 in two ways — by nursing the sick and by protecting 

 the healthy. Hitherto we have only tried to cure 

 the sick. We ought now to concentrate our efforts 

 on the protection of the healthy. Our ancestors sup- 

 pressed leprosy by suppressing the leprous — that is 

 to say, by shutting up the leprous in special hos- 

 pitals. Why not establish special hospitals for 

 tuberculosis on similar lines to arrest the dissemina- 

 tion of the malady? 



It is monstrous that persons convalescent from 

 contagious di.seases should be allowed to walk 

 about in public places, and it is equally monstrous 

 that a workman should have to expose himself to 

 the danger of infection from a fellow-workman suf- 

 fering from tuberculosis in the workshop where he 

 has to earn his living, because there is no law to 

 prevent it. 



WANTED— PEEVENTOEItTMS. 



Rejected by the sanatoriums and the hospitals, 

 the really dangerous contagious cases are always at 

 large. Remembering that 150,000 deaths from 

 tuberculosis are registered in France, and allowing 

 that each case lasts on an average about two years 

 before terminating fatally, there are thus at least 

 300,000 sufferers every year who require treatment, 

 but who, under the present system, are condemned 

 to spread the disease to all around them. For this 

 number hospital accommodation is urgent, but the 

 sanitary regime could only be accepted by the 

 patients on condition that their families are sup- 

 ported during the period of treatment. 



Steps to Stop Sweating. 



Mr. and Mrs. Ramsay Macdonald wTite in the 



Independent Review on sweated home Industrie.^. 



Closely associated in the arrangement of the Dail; 



News exhibition, they now present their conclusions. 



What thev have to say to this is thus succinctly 



summed up : — 



Sweating arises from an entanglement of social causes- 

 It is an accumulation of effects. It depends as much upon 

 the fact that there is always a proportion of sick husbands, 

 as upon the fact that there is alway." a goodl.v number of 

 exacting employers. Let tis. by a system of licenses, im- 

 prove the sanitary conditions under which the work is. 

 done; let us. by remedying tlie law of Truck and 

 adapting tlie " particulars " clause to all home-work con- 

 ditions, enable the workers to gain some definite idea of 

 what their wages are to be: let us demand that the Govern- 

 ment and all Local Authorities shall make their fair wages 

 and conditions clauses a reality: let us support those or- 

 ganisations which, like the Women's Industrial Council, 

 exist for the purpose of spreading information regarding 

 the genenil industrial conditions of women, and of making 

 proposals in detail as to how these conditions can be im- 

 proved: and. finally, let ns as consumers take what pre- 

 cautions we can to' secure that shop-keepers and others do- 

 not make us the victims of sweated goods. These will be 

 valuable palliatives: but sweating as such must always be- 

 found in the outskirts of the industrial lawlessness and 

 disorder, which exist in the beat regulated system of com- 

 petitive industry. 



