36 YELLOW FEVER PROPHYLAXIS IN NEW ORLEANS 



was appointed to frame regulations and to supervise. Simultane- 

 ously Consuls in Foreign Ports were instructed to report to the 

 Surgeon-General the existence of contagious diseases. The Service 

 was also empowered to publish weekly bulletins upon health and to 

 transmit them to their officers and to other public health bodies. 

 After this date the expansion of the public health duties of the 

 Service rapidly increased. The Surgeon-General instituted an in- 

 spection of all State and Local Quarantine Boards requiring them 

 to conform to the law, whilst under the Immigration Acts all 

 incoming aliens had to be examined by the Marine Hospital Service 

 Officers for physical soundness. At a number of ports the carrying 

 out of quarantine was handed over by the State to the Central 

 Machinery of the Federal Government. In certain instances, however, 

 the national Government through its Public Health Service assumed 

 charge because of the non-compliance of the local authorities with 

 the law. 



A number of States still conduct their own quarantine, and whilst 

 the Federal Government takes care that the quarantine law is strictly 

 administered it has no right to prevent a state or local authority 

 adding additional and often onerous quarantine measures to the 

 minimum standard which the Federal Government regard as efficient. 

 This has, in the case of New Orleans, been brought prominently 

 forward in 1905, and the opinion has been freely expressed that in 

 the interests of safety and commerce there should be exclusive 

 national control. The present dual system is complex, and more- 

 over, as the local authority exacts fees, whilst the Federal Govern- 

 ment does not, commerce would gain. A great feature of the 

 Marine Hospital Service is the Staff of Surgeons, who are stationed 

 at various foreign ports with which the United States is in trade 

 relationship, and also the number of surgeons who are available for 

 sending to places, like New Orleans, when an emergency arises. In 

 their very varied professional duties both abroad and in the United 

 States, the Surgeons of the Marine Hospital Service gain a very 

 considerable experience not only in treating infectious diseases such 

 as Yellow Fever and plague, but also in dealing with men of all 

 nationalities and in hunting out disease. They wear a mihtary 

 uniform, and the business-like and determined way in which they set 

 about their appointed work unquestionably inspires confidence! This 



