Board of Health, 1796. 55 



' You may remember that in the Chester Infirmary we 

 have, for the last twelve years, received all infectious fever 

 patients that require our assistance into the fever wards, 

 one for each sex, appropriated to this purpose. 



' This institution arose from the speculations, which you 

 know had engaged my attention, on the nature of con- 

 tagion. Numerous facts having proved that a person 

 liable to receive the small-pox was not infected by a 

 patient in the distemper when placed at a very little 

 distance, I next considered the nature of the contagion 

 which produces putrid fevers ; I soon discovered that their 

 infectious atmosphere was limited to much narrower ex- 

 tent than even the small-pox. So manifestly I observed 

 this to be the case, that in a clean, well-aired room of a 

 moderate size, the contagious poison is so much diluted 

 with fresh air, that it very rarely produces the distemper 

 even in nurses exposed to all the putrid miasms of the 

 breath, perspiration, faeces, &c. Whereas, in the close, 

 dirty, and small rooms of the poor, the whole family 

 generally catch the fever. Hence we may conclude, that 

 in a well aired and clean apartment, the air is seldom so 

 fully impregnated with the poison as to acquire an in- 

 fectious quality. 



' By taking out of a house the first person who sickens 

 of a fever, we preserve the rest of the family from infec- 

 tion, together with an indefinite number of their neigh- 

 bours, who would otherwise catch the infection. At this 

 very time, when the inhabitants of Manchester, and many 

 other pkces, are afflicted with a fatal contagious epidemic, 

 only two patients are now in our fever wards, and both 

 convalescent : and the apothecary to the infirmary, who 

 attends the out poor of the whole city, informs me that he 

 has now not a single fever patient under his care/ 



