Ju»E 2, 1911] 



SCIENCE 



836 



public health is too often measured by 

 the frequency with which coal ashes are 

 scattered in alleys or the length of time 

 that decaying vegetable matter remains in 

 tin cans in hot weather. In some cases the 

 larger part of the annual health depart- 

 ment appropriation must be expended for 

 garbage collection and disposal, leaving 

 only a pitifully small residue for other 

 needs. To mention a single instance, the 

 collection and conservation of garbage and 

 ashes cost the Minneapolis Health Depart- 

 ment in 1909 about $57,000, leaving ap- 

 proximately $43,000 for all the other ac- 

 tivities of a health department serving a 

 city of over 300,000 inhabitants. 



One thing should be clearly understood 

 by municipal authorities and by the gen- 

 eral public, that regular collection and 

 cleanly handling of ashes and tabic scraps 

 is not one of the surest and most profitable 

 ways of protecting health and preventing 

 disease. Efficient administration of this 

 branch of public work should not be al- 

 lowed to take the place of measures that 

 directly affect the public health.^ 



Few dangers to health have loomed 

 larger in the public eye than that from 

 "sewer gas." Elaborate and amazingly 

 expensive systems of plumbing are re- 

 quired by law to be installed in every 

 newly erected dwelling house in our large 

 American cities. Plumbing inspection to- 

 day occupies a large part of the working 

 force of many municipal health depart- 

 ments. In Baltimore in 1908, to cite a 

 single instance, this work was carried out 



° Any one who fancies that to depreciate gar- 

 bage disposal as a health measure is flogging a 

 dead horse will be disabused of this impression if 

 he has experience with the beginnings of a typhoid 

 epidemic and learns how often public attention is 

 diverted from significant issues like water-supply, 

 milk-supply, and contact, by appeals to the preju- 

 dice against slovenly ways of handling harmless 

 household refuse. 



by one inspector of plumbing, seven assist- 

 ant inspectors of plumbing and one drain 

 inspector at a total salary cost of $8,250 

 or about one tenth of the total salary ap- 

 propriation for all public health work. 

 And yet, if all the most recent and search- 

 ing investigations such as those of Winslow 

 and others are to be believed, the actual 

 peril to health involved in the entrance of 

 small quantities of sewer air into houses 

 is so small as to be practically negligible. 

 It may be questioned whether plumbing 

 inspection, as ordinarily conducted, can be 

 shown to save a single life or prevent a 

 single case of disease. There is certainly 

 no reason to suppose that any infectious 

 disease is due to germs carried in sewer air. 

 It might reasonably be maintained that 

 slightly leaky gas fixtures are a much more 

 serious menace to the health of house 

 dwellers than defective plumbing. At all 

 events our present knowledge affords small 

 justification for the expenditure of public 

 money to insure that the odor of pepper- 

 mint does not enter our houses when oil of 

 peppermint is designedly introduced int« 

 the house drains. It may be worth while 

 for the house builder to satisfy himself of 

 the character of the plumbing as of the 

 character of the mortar, but compulsory 

 inspection by public officials is hardly 

 warranted on the ground of a high degree 

 of demonstrated danger to the public 

 health. It is certain, too, that the enforced 

 installation of immensely complicated and 

 elaborate piping and trapping systems 

 simply adds to the cost of building without 

 any compensating hygienic advantages. 

 The plumbing ordinances of our large 

 cities often contain inconsistencies and 

 contradictions, what is required in one 

 city being sometimes forbidden in another. 

 A revision and simplification of municipal 

 plumbing regulations, a minimizing of 

 official inspection and especially an educa- 



